•  FROM -THE- 

SCIENTIFIC- LIBRARY-OF 

•JACQUES  -LOEB- 


MEMORIAL  BIOGRAPHY 

OF 

ADELE  M.  FIELDE 

HUMANITARIAN 


BY 

HELEN  NORTON  STEVENS 


PUBLISHED  BY 

THE  FIELDE  MEMORIAL  COMMITTEE 

NEW  YORK,  PHILADELPHIA,  CHICAGO,  SEATTLE 


Copyright,  1918,  by 
HELEN  NORTON   STEVENS 


Press  of 

Pigott   Printing  Concern,   Seattle 
1918 


CONTENTS 

Page 
Preface    7 

Introduction  9 

Chapters 

I.  Ancestry,  Birth  and  Parentage 19 

II.  Early  Environment;  Character  and  Per- 
sonality    27 

III.  Character  and  Personality   (Continued) —     39 

IV.  A  Psychic  Experience 50 

V.  Attending  the  Normal  College;  Friendship 
With  Miss  Chilcott;  Engagement  to 
Cyrus  Chilcott 56 

VI.  A  Voyage  to  the  Orient;  Miss  Fielde's  Own 

Story   66 

VII.  Death  of  Cyrus  Chilcott;  111  at  Hongkong     77 
VIII.  Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 84 

IX.  Vacation;  in  the  Lecture  Field;  Return  to 

Swatow   103 

X.  The   "Biblewomen" 111 

XI.  Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature;  The 
True  God ;  After  Death ;  Life  of  Jesus ; 
Book  of  Genesis;  Swatow  Dictionary 123 

XII.  Return  to  America;  Preparing  for  Greater 

Usefulness;  More  Lectures 144 

XIII.  Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Organic 

Evolution;  Creating  a  College 154 

XIV.  Change  of  Religious  Opinion;  Enlarged 
Sphere  of  Activities;  A  Dangerous  Situ- 
ation   .  168 


779621 


XV.  Ill  at  Fielde  Lodge ;  Resignation  From  Mis- 
sionary Service ;  Her  Reason  for  So  Doing  181 

XVI.  Journey    to    India;    Impressions    of    That 

Country;  The  Taj  Mahal 190 

XVII.  In  Egypt;  The  Holy  City;  Ancient  and 
Modern  Greece;  Taking  the  Waters  of 
Carlsbad 199 

XVIII.  Studying   the    German    Social   System;   In 

Berlin;  Death  of  Mrs.  Davis 209 

XIX.  Travel   in   Russia;   Jew-baiting;   Invoking 

Aid  from  America 216 

XX.  Travels  in  France,  Spain,  Italy  and  Algiers  224 

XXI.  Return   to   America;    Drawing-Room   Lec- 
tures   232 

XXII.  The   League   for   Political   Education;    Its 

Organization   and   Activities 238 

XXIII.  Miss  Fielde  As  A  Writer 250 

XXIV.  Miss  Fielde  As  A  Scientist— 260 

XXV.  Her  Religious  Beliefs 273 

XXVI.  Philosophy  and  Psychology 284 

XXVII.  Leaving  New  York;  Seattle;  Alaska 296 

XXVIII.  Civic  Activities ;  Sanitation ;  Public  Health ; 

Direct  Legislation 306 

XXIX.  The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 316 

XXX.  Return  to  Seattle ;  Prohibition  Campaign ; 

Trustee  on  Library  Board ;  The  Western 
Woman's  Outlook 329 

XXXI.  Intimate  Friendships  — 341 

XXXII.  Her  Final  Work 357 

XXXIII.  Her  Last  Journey-  .  365 


LIST   OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde  (Her  Latest  Photograph.) 
Parents. 

Her  First  Teacher,  Mrs.  Adeline  M.  Payne. 
Miss  Fielde  in  1864. 
Cyrus  Chilcott. 
The  Biblewomen. 

The  True  God.     (Native  Block  Printing.) 
Fielde  Lodge. 

Kodak  Picture  of  Miss  Fielde  in  Seattle  1907. 
Home  of  Mrs.  John  M.  Winslow,  Meeting  Place  of  the 
Washington  Women's  Legislative  Committee. 


ummrtt  mm)  &0  fti  ttf? 
morlb,  tb.  rir  rfy  i*f  anb  tfnbnrino,  Ijolb  on 
tiff  *at**m  of  tb,£  human  family  ia  at- 
taturft  by  tl|f  tr  txttlitntt  aa 

"&I|r  «il}0  90*0  tntn  tit? 
aljatuim  of  bratly  tljr^  nr  four  tim^  a  in  tl|e  ruttra* 
of  Ijf  r  ^  xiatf  nr*  anil  r^  tttrna  ^  arl|  tim^  ,  bringing 
a  n*  m  Uf*  mitlj  ly^r,  bow  mor^  for  b,  nmanily  tb.an 
tb.^  mritf  r  of  hooka,  tlj*  op^  ra  aing^r,  ilj*  fin^ 
artiat,  tb.e  akillfnl  pljjjairian,  ll|r  mia?  uotrr  or 
tb.*  moman  in  pnblir  lifp,  na^fnl  anb 
a  a  thrii  all  arr. 


abiiir  in  all  uiomrn.  0omrtimra  a  moman  mini 
l|aa  no  prog^  ng,  b.aa  to  takf  a  ^tatf  aa  b.?r  broob, 
anb  tb.at  ia  a  UJotbf  rb.oob,  too." 

H 


PREFACE 

THIS  book  presents  the  life-history  of  Adele 
Marion   Fielde.      It   tells   of  a  woman  who 
devoted  her  entire  earthly  career  to  doing 
good.     It  describes  a  person  of  world-wide  vision 
and  transcendent  ideals  who  saw  things  in  their 
true  light  and  strove  to  make  ideals  real.     It  depicts 
a  character  whose  only  ambition  was  to  advance 
the  cause  of  humanity. 

This  book  is  published  for  the  purpose  of  per- 
petuating a  great  influence  for  good.  By  using 
an  illustrious  example  it  endeavors  to  portray  the 
grandeur  of  an  unselfish  life.  It  seeks  to  empha- 
size the  truth  of  the  thought  that  consideration  for 
others  is  the  only  true  culture,  the  only  source  of 
true  greatness.  If  it  will  serve  to  inspire  even  a 
few  of  its  readers  to  seek  the  higher  plane  of  hu- 
man existence,  its  efforts  will  not  have  failed. 

This  book  is  published  by  the  Fielde  Memorial 
Committee,  an  organization  composed  of  men  and 
women  whose  names  are  hereto  appended,  who 
were  personal  friends,  chosen  companions  and  ad- 
mirers of  Miss  Fielde.  They  knew  her  intimately, 

Page  Seven 


appreciated  her  wisdom  and  experienced  her  love. 
This  book  commemorates  their  deep  affection  for 
her,  acknowledges  their  obligations  to  her  and 
forms  a  covenant  of  abiding  faith  with  her. 

NEW  YORK  SEATTLE 

Mrs.  William  P.  Hamilton,  Mrs.  John  M.  Winslow, 
Mrs.  Samuel  M.  Cauldwell,  Mrs    Helen  Norton  Stevens, 
Mrs.  E.  M.  Foote,  ^       T  ,      ^  .„ 

Mr.  Robert  Erskiie  Ely.        Mrs'  John  Erlkson' 

__  w  Mrs.   Kenelm  Winslow, 

_       ™L™TA          Mrs.  John  TrumbuU, 
Dr.  Edward  J.  Nolan.  ,T       n       XT   TIT  T        uv 

Mrs.  Geo.  N.  McLoughlm, 

CHICAGO  Mrs    Chas    Schalkenbach, 

Mrs.  Heman  H.  Field.  Mrs.  Geo.  H.  Walker, 

SEATTLE  Mrs.  Harvey  L.  Glenn, 

Mrs.  W.  D.  Perkins,  Mrs.  Dean  H.  White, 

Mrs.  A.  B.  Stewart,  Mrs.  P.  D.  Hughes, 
Mrs.  Livingston  B.  Stedman,  Miss  Sophia  C.  Johns, 

Mrs.  W.  S.  Griswold,  Rev.  William  K.  McKibben. 


Page   Eight 


INTRODUCTION 


MISS  FIELDE  was  a  truly  exceptional  wom- 
an. She  was  both  good  and  great.  She 
was  good  because  it  was  her  nature  to  be 
so  and  great  because  she  possessed  the  power  to 
govern  her  instinctive  promptings  with  uniform 
wisdom.  To  her,  love  of  kind  is  a  principle  of  the 
highest  import  and  to  help  others  the  paramount 
duty  of  mankind.  She  regarded  this  principle  and 
the  performance  of  its  co-ordinate  duty  as  the  key 
to  the  great  problems  of  the  universe.  On  this 
depends  the  conquest  of  the  earth,  the  advance- 
ment of  the  race  and  the  determination  of  human 
destiny.  Both  her  religious  beliefs  and  scientific 
convictions  served  to  support  this  doctrine.  Relig- 
ion taught  her  that  our  nearness  to  God  is  in  pro- 
portion to  our  capacity  to  love  His  children  and 
our  willingness  to  bear  their  burdens.  Science 
demonstrates  the  truth  that  moral  expansion  is  a 
condition  precedent  to  the  increasing  complexities 
of  organic  evolution.  With  analogic  wisdom  she 
once  said: 

"Just  as  natural  selection,  struggle  for  existence 
and  survival  of  the  fittest  procured  man  to  the  head- 
ship of  the  animal  kingdom,  so  will  co-operation, 

Page  Nine 


loyalty  and  love  promote  him  into  the  Kingdom  to 
Come." 

Miss  Fielde  was  possessed  of  three  ruling  pas- 
sions, love  of  humanity,  love  of  truth  and  love  of 
country. 

For  love  of  humanity  she  gave  twenty  years  of 
service  as  a  Christian  missionary  to  the  Orient.  In 
this,  as  in  all  her  other  undertakings,  her  achieve- 
ments were  marvelous.  She  not  only  performed 
her  routine  duties  efficiently  and  faithfully  but  her 
contributed  works  of  supererogation  were  valuable 
beyond  appraisement.  A  few  of  these  latter  may 
be  enumerated  as  follows:  She  compiled,  wrote 
and  published  a  dictionary  of  the  Swatow  dialect 
with  English  equivalents,  wrote  and  published  a 
Life  of  Jesus  in  Chinese,  wrote  over  fifty  tracts, 
sermons  and  Gospel  Lessons  in  Chinese,  translated 
the  Book  of  Genesis  into  Chinese,  built  the  Fielde 
Lodge  and  created  the  Biblewomen. 

This  latter  achievement  she  regarded  as  the 
greatest  work  of  her  life,  claiming  that  it  brought 
her  the  greatest  honor  of  her  entire  career.  From 
the  affectionate  esteem  in  which  she  was  held  by 
the  loyal  Biblewomen  and  the  reputation  she  ac- 
quired from  her  earnestness  as  a  Christian  teacher 
she  came  to  be  called  "The  Love  Woman"  by  the 
Chinese  natives. 

What  higher  title  of  nobility  was  ever  conferred 

Page   Ten 


on  Norman  blood?      What  greater  source  of  au- 
thority ever  conferred  a  title  of  distinction  ? 

Love  of  truth  caused  Miss  Fielde  to  modify 
many  preconceived  ideas  concerning  some  of  the 
more  important  problems  of  human  existence  be- 
fore she  reached  middle-age.  The  accepted  Script- 
ural conception  of  the  origin,  purpose  and  destiny 
of  humankind  was  largely  a  matter  of  inheritance 
and  early  discipline  with  her.  But  the  time  came 
when  she  doubted  the  truth  of  the  Biblical  account 
of  man's  genesis,  became  dissatisfied  with  the 
Christian  plan  of  Salvation  and  rejected  the  ortho- 
dox dogma  which  provides  future  awards  for  right- 
eous conduct  and  future  punishments  for  unright- 
eous persons.  In  other  words,  she  reached  a  stage 
in  her  development  sometimes  described  as  the  Re- 
ligious Transition.  She  awoke  from  the  security 
of  mental  hibernation  to  a  condition  of  active 
though  unorganized  consciousness. 

Philosophers  have  likened  an  emergence  into  the 
religious  transition  to  the  process  of  cutting  loose 
from  a  customary  mooring  and  drifting  with  the 
uncertain  tide  in  quest  of  some  unknown,  unchart- 
ed place  of  anchorage.  The  change  is  always  at- 
tended by  moral  danger,  usually  by  intellectual 
waste  and  often  by  spiritual  submergence.  It  is 
said  that  it  requires  three  generations  of  cultured 
ancestry  to  bring  an  individual  to  this  great  change 

Page    Eleven 


and  two  more  generations  to  adapt  his  descend- 
ants to  the  new  order  of  things. 

Miss  Fielde  wasted  no  time  in  vain  gropings 
and  suffered  neither  moral  reversion  nor  intellect- 
ual atrophy.  When  the  Word  of  God  failed  to 
satisfy  her  desire  to  know  the  truth  she  immediate- 
ly began  a  systematic  investigation  of  His  Works. 
She  took  up  the  study  of  science,  both  organic  and 
inorganic,  with  the  result  that  a  veritable  fairyland 
of  truth  was  revealed  to  her.  However,  her  scien- 
tific conclusions  concerning  the  "Riddle  of  the 
Universe*  *  had  a  greater  tendency  to  support  and 
sustain  the  truths  of  Revelation  than  to  contradict 
them.  Or  to  be  more  explicit,  the  objective  knowl- 
edge she  acquired  from  her  scientific  researches 
supplemented  and  illuminated  the  subjective  wis- 
dom she  possessed  as  a  religious  heritage. 

On  one  memorable  occasion  she  was  asked  what 
effect  her  scientific  attainments  had  had  on  her  re- 
ligious faith  and  beliefs. 

"In  essentials,"  she  said,  "my  faith  became  more 
pronounced  and  my  religious  opinions  became 
more  fully  justified.  True,  I  had  to  cast  aside  some 
of  the  church  dogmas  and  creedal  doctrines,  once 
high  in  my  esteem,  but  on  the  whole  my  religious 
vision  was  greatly  extended  by  my  scientific 
studies." 

When  asked  if  she  still  accepted  the  teachings 
of  the  Bible  as  veridical,  she  answered: 

Page   Twelve 


"I  am  inclined  to  believe  that  the  account  of 
Jesus  contained  in  the  synoptic  Gospels  is  true/' 

"Then,"  her  interrogator  argued,  "you  actually 
believe  that  Jesus  performed  the  miracles  of  which 
these  records  of  tradition  credit  Him?" 

"Yes,"  she  replied,  "I  find  no  reason  to  think 
otherwise.  When  we  stop  to  consider  the  marvel- 
ous phenomena  of  the  normal  functions  of  the  soul, 
such,  for  instance,  as  metabolism,  reproduction, 
evolution  and  regeneration,  its  abnormal  activities 
seem  insignificant  in  comparison." 

"But,  Miss  Fielde,  do  you  still  adhere  to  your  be- 
lief in  the  divine  origin  of  Jesus?" 

"Certainly,  I  believe  in  the  biogenetic  idea  and 
still  regard  the  Deity  as  the  author  of  organic  life 
as  well  as  the  creator  of  inorganic  matter." 

On  being  asked,  if,  in  her  opinion,  there  was  any 
well  established  scientific  proof  that  the  soul  is 
immortal,  she  said: 

"In  my  opinion  there  is  not.  Science,"  she 
added,  "teaches  that  there  is  no  such  thing  as  abso- 
lute annihilation,  and,  it  seems  to  me,  that  it  is  un- 
reasonable to  believe  that  the  fate  of  the  soul  is  to 
be  an  exceptional  one.  I  am  inclined  to  believe  that 
the  soul,  like  everything  else,  will  persist  forever. 
In  our  imperfect  state  of  development,  however,  I 
sometimes  doubt  if  the  soul  retains  its  personal 
identity  after  separating  from  the  body.  I  hope 
and  trust  that  it  does,  but  I  do  not  know." 

Love  of  country  prompted  Miss  Fielde  to  devote 
the  final  twenty  years  of  her  life  to  the  work  of 

Page  Thirteen 


teaching  civil  government  and  to  the  duties  of  poli- 
tical leadership.  It  was  a  belief  peculiar  to  her 
mind  that  ignorance  of  civil  rights  was  as  great  a 
source  of  evil  as  negligence  of  civic  duties.  Be- 
cause of  this  idea  much  of  her  political  writings, 
lectures  and  other  teachings  were  given  with  a  view 
of  developing  a  knowledge  of  the  rights  of  citizens 
as  individuals  rather  than  those  involving  obliga- 
tions as  social  units.  Also,  because  of  this  belief, 
she  was  always  tolerant  of  Socialism,  Syndicalism, 
Anarchy,  etc.,  though  not  at  all  in  sympathy  with 
any  of  these  heterogeneous  doctrines.  On  the  con- 
trary, she  was  a  thorough  American,  holding  that 
the  American  social  compact,  whether  embodied 
in  the  written  Constitution,  legal  enactments  or 
implied  agreements,  contains  within  itself  the  po- 
tential power  of  political  progress  and  the  needed 
remedies  for  all  our  political  ills. 

Before  she  went  to  the  Orient,  the  right  to  vote 
was  regarded  by  the  American  public  as  a  sacred 
trust.  Self-respecting  citizens  exercised  this  func- 
tion as  a  conscientious  duty,  each  proud  of  the  priv- 
ilege that  gave  him  equal  participation  in  the  con- 
duct of  governmental  affairs.  A  great  change  took 
place  while  she  was  absent.  On  her  return  she 
found  the  nation  in  a  state  of  political  degeneracy. 
The  elective  franchise,  once  the  trusted  sentinel  of 
our  national  liberty,  had  been  prostituted  to  the 

Page    Fourteen 


service  of  sordid  gain,  commercialized  vice  and  of- 
ficial corruption.  The  political  affairs  of  the  land 
had  passed  out  of  the  hands  of  the  earnest-minded, 
substantial  citizens  and  were  now  under  the  control 
and  direction  of  the  predatory  and  parasitic  ele- 
ments. Political  activity  had  degenerated  into  a 
vice  and  was  no  longer  a  source  of  pride  but  a  cause 
for  reproach. 

At  this  period  of  our  nation's  history  many  of 
the  political  leaders,  as  well  as  the  followers,  were 
men  of  foreign  birth,  unaffected  by  American  tra- 
ditions, ignorant  of  American  institutions,  often 
contemptuous  of  the  people  and  laws  of  the  United 
States.  Their  only  interest  in  the  Republic  was  to 
exploit  it  for  personal  gain.  However,  it  is  not  to 
be  understood  that  the  foreign  element  was  alone 
responsible  for  our  departure  from  the  standards 
of  good  citizenship.  Many  of  our  foremost  citi- 
zens were  equally  reprehensible.  During  the  Civil 
War  not  a  few  Americans  of  Puritanic  ancestry 
and  Colonial  descent  had  acquired  some  very  bad 
habits.  They  had  learned  to  steal  as  well  as  to  kill. 
And,  while  at  the  close  of  the  conflict  they  had 
readily  laid  aside  their  swords,  they  persisted  in  the 
practice  of  the  former  accomplishment  for  many 
years  thereafter.  It  was  Miss  Fielde's  belief  that 
by  organization  and  concerted  action  on  the  part 
of  the  good  citizens  of  the  country  the  political 


Page    Fifteen 


power  could  be  wrested  from  the  evil  hands  that 
held  it,  respect  for  American  institutions  and  Am- 
erican ideals  rehabilitated  and  patriotism  reawak- 
ened. She  resolved  at  once  to  initiate  a  movement 
for  making  this  experiment. 

She  fully  appreciated  the  difficulties  of  the  under- 
taking and  the  opposition  she  would  encounter  and 
must  combat.  She  knew  that  so-called  practical 
politics  consisted  of  nothing  less  than  a  species  of 
piracy — a  method  by  which  the  law-abiding  portion 
of  the  public  were  compelled  to  pay  tribute  to  or- 
ganized predacity.  She  also  knew  that  this  cor- 
rupt system  was  thoroughly  established  and  that 
she  would  be  engaging  in  a  war  with  organized 
greed,  vested  interest  and  entrenched  conserva- 
tism. But  she  did  not  falter.  With  courage  sur- 
passing that  of  a  knight  of  medieval  fame  she  chal- 
lenged the  field  and  won. 

It  is  impossible  to  estimate  the  measure  of  credit 
to  which  Miss  Fielde  is  entitled  for  the  compara- 
tively recent  political  reforms  and  advances  in  both 
New  York  City  and  Seattle.  She  was  a  pioneer  and 
leader  in  both  movements,  though  she  had  many 
co-workers  and  followers.  In  both  cities  her 
achievements  were  indeed  wonderful  and  the 
changes  she  so  efficiently  helped  to  bring  about 
were  of  permanent  value. 

Tammany  is  no  longer  an  irresistible  force  in 

Page  Sixteen 


the  government  of  New  York  and  the  "upstate  or- 
ganization" is  no  longer  a  dependable  machine.  On 
the  other  hand,  The  League  for  Political  Educa- 
tion, of  which  Miss  Fielde  was  one  of  the  found- 
ers and  for  a  decade  its  guiding  spirit,  still  exists. 
It  is,  as  ever,  a  source  of  patriotic  effort,  healthful 
instruction  and  good  influence.  The  Political 
Primer  of  New  York,  of  which  Miss  Fielde  was 
the  author,  is  still  in  print  and  still  used  as  a  text 
book  by  those  who  wish  to  acquire  a  knowledge  of 
the  first  principles  of  good  government. 

Miss  Fielde's  political  and  social  service  work  in 
Seattle  was  done  in  the  declining  years  of  her  life, 
but  her  achievements  were  none-the-less  great. 
When  she  took  up  her  residence  in  the  Pacific 
Northwest,  Seattle  was  distinguished  as  the  second 
city  in  the  United  States  for  the  importance  of  its 
white  slave  traffic.  The  State  of  Washington  was 
politically  ring-ridden  and  honeycombed  with  of- 
ficial corruption.  Many  of  the  legislative  enact- 
ments were  framed  with  a  view  of  increasing  pri- 
vate wealth  rather  than  in  the  interest  of  public 
welfare.  The  political  conditions  of  the  Northwest 
were  no  different  from  those  of  the  Northeast. 

Miss  Fielde  came  to  Washington  just  in  time  to 
take  part  in  the  state  campaign  for  woman  suffrage. 
The  subsequent  enfranchisement  of  women  afford- 
ed her  a  long-wished  for  opportunity  for  political 

Page  Seventeen 


house-cleaning,  of  which  she  took  instant  advan- 
tage. She  proceeded  without  delay  to  organize  the 
newly  qualified  voters  of  the  State  into  political 
study  clubs,  legislative  committees,  good  govern- 
ment leagues  and  quiz  congresses,  and  to  teach 
them  by  means  of  pamphlets,  circulars  and  lectures 
the  duties  of  citizenship.  Before  she  responded  to 
the  "call  to  go  up  higher,*'  Washington  was  the 
most  politically  advanced  State  in  the  Union.  Laws 
providing  for  state- wide  prohibition,  direct  legisla- 
tion, workmen's  compensation,  protective  insur- 
ance, widows'  pensions,  suppression  of  prostitu- 
tion, minimum  wage  for  women,  were  enacted,  as 
well  as  many  other  measures  equally  salutary  and 
wise. 

It  is  conceded  by  all,  that  these  advances  were 
due  to  the  initiation,  promotion  and  support  of  the 
women  voters  of  the  State,  of  which  Miss  Fielde 
was  an  acknowledged  leader. 


Page  Eighteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 


CHAPTER  ONE 


Ancestry,  Birth  and  Parentage. 


DURING  the  formative  period  of  the  Ameri- 
can Republic  it  was  largely  a  custom  with 
biographers  to  represent  their  subjects  as 
"self  made."     This  was  a  convenient  term  used  to 
describe  a  person  of  obscure  origin  and  humble  sur- 
roundings, who,  from  some  unaccountable  mental 
or  moral  superiority,  rose  to  a  high  plane  of  social 
esteem. 

Miss  Fielde  was  not  "self  made,**  being  neither 
a  genius  of  abnormal  intuition  nor  an  atavistic 
freak.  She  was  simply  the  natural  product  of  a 
splendid  ancestry  and  a  highly  advantageous  en- 
vironment. History  reveals  her  ancestors  in  the 
front  rank  in  each  successive  stage  of  American 
development  from  Colonial  times  to  the  present 
era.  Social  leadership  was  her  birthright. 

She  belonged  to  the  famous  Field  family,  of 
which  David  Dudley  Field,  Cyrus  W.  Field,  Justice 
Stephen  A.  Field,  Marshall  Field  and  Eugene  Field 

Page    Nineteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

are  a  few  of  the  better  known  representatives  in  the 
United  States.  In  England  the  family  is  no  less 
celebrated.  There  it  is  classified  as  belonging  to  the 
"lesser  nobility,*'  knights,  baronets,  etc.,  persons 
who,  as  a  rule,  have  gained  renown  as  the  result  of 
personal  achievement  rather  than  those  who  had 
inherited  their  prestige  from  distinguished  ances- 
tors. 

Heman  H.  Field,  author  of  one  of  the  several 
Field  genealogies  extant,  finds  that  Miss  Adele  M. 
Fielde  was  a  direct  descendant  in  the  seventh  gen- 
eration, of  Zachariah  Field  and  Sarah  (Thornton) 
Field,  the  account  of  whose  courtship  and  marriage 
forms  a  romantic  chapter  in  the  historic  miscellany 
of  Rhode  Island  Colony.  The  fact  that  Misa 
Fielde *s  name  does  not  appear  in  any  of  the  Field 
genealogies  is  due  to  several  causes.  First,  she  was 
singularly  impersonal,  so  absorbed  in  her  labors  for 
others  that  she  took  comparatively  little  interest  in 
herself  as  an  individual.  Another  thing,  her  tastes 
were  very  democratic  despite  her  rich  lineage.  It 
was  a  favorite  thought  with  her  that  a  person's 
birth  and  breeding  is  so  indelibly  stamped  on  his 
form  and  face  and  so  well  reflected  by  his  manner 
and  conduct  that  records  of  ancestral  virtues  pos- 
sess little  indicative  value.  For  a  further  and,  per- 
haps, chief  cause,  she  had  practically  changed  her 

Page  Twenty 


Ancestry,  Birth,  Parentage 

name  before  any  of  the  Field  genealogies  were 
compiled  and  printed.  From  time  immemorial  the 
family  name  was  Field  and  her  parents  had  called 
her  Adelia.  When  about  sixteen  years  old,  she 
became  a  contributor  to  the  current  literature  of 
that  day  under  the  pen  name  of  Adele  M.  Fielde. 
She  did  this  at  first  for  the  purpose  of  concealing 
her  identity  as  a  writer  from  her  neighborhood  as- 
sociates, but  in  time,  as  she  gained  fame  and  became 
widely  known  by  her  nom  de  plume,  she  dropped 
her  childhood  cognomen  and  used  her  pen  name 
for  private  as  well  as  public  identification.  Later  on 
she  was  baptized  "Adele  Marion"  and  her  patrony- 
mic appears  in  the  registry  of  the  Baptist  Church 
containing  the  final  e. 

Miss  Fielde  was  also  descended  on  her  mother's 
side  from  Jonathan  Edwards  and  his  wife, 
Sarah  (Pierpont)  Edwards.  Both  the  Edwards 
and  the  Pierponts  are  representative  types  of  the 
best  American  lineage.  The  descendants  of  Jona- 
than and  Sarah  Edwards  have  been  authoritatively 
distinguished  as  examples  of  eugenic  excellence. 
In  many  of  the  recent  scientific  treatises  touching 
on  the  value  of  applied  eugenics,  the  descendants 
of  this  famous  couple  are  used  to  illustrate  the  prin- 
ciple of  hereditary  virtue.  It  has  been  authenti- 
cally found  that  Jonathan  Edwards  and  his  wife 

Page  Twenty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

were  the  progenitors,  near  and  remote,  of  six  hun- 
dred descendants;  that  fully  one-half  of  that  num- 
ber have  been  distinguished  for  having  occupied,  or 
of  still  occupying  foremost  places  in  the  business 
and  professional  life  of  the  nation;  among  them 
were  and  are  college  presidents,  statesmen,  authors, 
artists,  scientists,  captains  of  industry,  financiers, 
high  military  officers  and  leading  divines.  The 
same  authorities  state  that  not  one  of  this  notable 
family  has  ever  been  an  inmate  of  a  penal  institu- 
tion, almshouse  or  insane  hospital. 

While  Jonathan  Edwards  was  certainly  the 
leading  intellectual  light  of  his  age,  especially  so  in 
religious  thought,  still  the  whole  credit  of  the  glor- 
ious heritage  of  his  descendants  is  not  entirely  due 
to  his  blood.  Sarah  Pierpont  Edwards  was  fully 
his  equal  in  the  many  qualities  that  distinguished 
him,  and  in  some  things  his  superior. 

The  Pierponts  are  a  family  of  ancient  lineage, 
fine  culture  and  firm  social  status  in  both  England 
and  this  country.  The  English  branch  had  its 
origin  in  Sir  Robert  de  Pierrepont,  who  came  from 
Normandy  with  William  the  Conqueror.  At  the 
present  time  the  family  is  represented  in  the  Brit- 
ish peerage  by  a  duke  and  several  other  members 
of  the  nobility,  descendants  of  this  ancestral  knight. 
In  the  United  States  the  Pierponts  have  bred  true 

Page   Twenty-Two 


Ancestry,  Birth,  Parentage 

to  form.  They  readily  adapted  themselves  to  the 
new  civilization  without  reversionary  sacrifice,  or 
loss  of  refinement  from  the  narrowing  influence  of 
pioneer  life.  From  Colonial  days  to  the  present, 
they  have  represented  the  best  type  of  American 
citizenship. 

An  American  eugenist  of  recognized  celebrity 
is  inclined  to  credit  Miss  Fielde's  wealth  of  intel- 
lectual grace,  fine  poise  and  perfect  manners  to  an 
inheritance  from  Sarah  Pierpont  Edwards. 

"Who's  Who  in  America"  states  that  Adele 
Marion  Fielde  was  born  at  East  Rodman,  New 
York,  March  30th,  1 839.  The  same  authority  de- 
clares her  to  have  been  the  daughter  of  Leighton 
Field  and  Sophia  (Tiffany)  Field. 

From  all  available  accounts,  the  parents  of 
Miss  Fielde  were  exceptional  characters.  Both  of 
them  possessed  qualities  of  intellectual  refinement, 
moral  integrity  and  personal  independence  to  an 
unusual  degree.  In  writing  of  them,  Mrs.  Adele 
Richards  Fisher,  granddaughter  of  the  couple  and 
their  only  living  descendant,  states: 

"My  grandparents  were  poor  people,  having  had 
little  opportunity  to  acquire  an  education,  but  were 
much  respected  and  beloved.  Grandfather  was  a 
man  of  indomitable  will  and  strong  personality. 
Even  in  his  old  age  he  had  an  aversion  to  being 
waited  on.  Til  do  it  myself,'  was  his  frequent  ex- 

Page   Twenty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

pression.  He  learned  the  carpenter's  and  paint- 
er's trade  when  young,  but  did  not  follow  either 
occupation  consistently  or  exclusively  as  a  means 
of  gaining  a  livelihood.  He  painted  the  high 
steeple  of  the  Baptist  church  at  South  Rutland  (of 
which  he  and  grandmother  were  members)  after 
he  was  eighty  years  old.  The  church  was  across 
the  street  from  their  home,  and  he  had  the  care  of 
it  during  the  declining  years  of  his  life." 

Another  account  of  Leighton  Field,  received 
by  the  writer  hereof,  describes  him  as  a  "man  of 
powerful  physique  and  gentle  manners."  He  was 
looked  upon  always  as  one  of  the  first  men  of 
the  community  in  which  he  lived  and  a  leading 
spirit  in  all  public  affairs.  His  advice  was  always 
sought  in  matters  of  community  interest  and  it  was 
seldom  rejected.  He  had  no  enemies,  and  no  fa- 
miliar friends  outside  the  circle  of  his  immediate 
family.  He  was  a  person  of  intense  affection,  but 
not  at  all  demonstrative.  Adele  was  his  favorite 
child,  and  only  she  could  influence  him  to  unbend 
from  his  customary  attitude  of  dignified  reserve. 
Like  his  famous  daughter,  he  possessed  deeply 
rooted  convictions,  great  self-reliance  and  broad 
charity.  No  one  in  distress  ever  appealed  to  him 
for  aid  in  vain  and  no  one  ever  suffered  from  an 
unkind  word  or  unjust  deed  of  which  he  was  the 

Page  Twenty-Four 


MISS    FIELDE'S    FATHKR    AND    MOTHER 


Ancestry,  Birth,  Parentage 

source.      He    died    September    27th,     1878,    aged 
eighty-four  years. 

Sophia  (Tiffany)  Field  was  a  woman  of  un- 
usual culture.  True,  being  of  pioneer  life  and  ex- 
traction, her  educational  advantages  were  meager; 
but  she  was  an  omnivorous  reader.  She  eagerly 
devoured  the  contents  of  every  book  that  came  into 
her  possession,  reading  each  several  times,  often 
aloud  to  the  younger  members  of  her  family.  By 
this  latter  means  the  thought  of  Shakespeare,  Mil- 
ton, Addison,  Johnson,  Scott,  Hawthorne,  Coop- 
er, Dickens  and  Thackery  became  household  topics 
of  conversation  and  a  source  of  family  refinement. 
Mrs.  Field  is  said  to  have  been  "to  the  manner 
born/*  While  she  faithfully  performed  the  duties 
of  a  pioneer  housewife  and  a  pioneer  mother  with 
self-sacrificing  devotion,  her  instinctive  tastes  were 
not  at  all  in  accord  with  the  primitive  surroundings 
and  commonplace  existence  that  she  was  compelled 
to  endure.  But  she  accepted  her  lot  cheerfully, 
finding  solace  in  the  faith  that  some  way  would  be 
provided  by  which  her  children  would  escape  her 
fate.  She  had  a  strong  sense  of  humor  that 
prompted  her  to  laugh  readily  at  the  small  vexa- 
tions and  even  at  the  more  serious  privations  of 
her  uninteresting  career,  but  she  never  ridiculed 
persons.  She  resembled  her  celebrated  daughter 

Page  Twenty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

in  quiet  self-possession,  graceful  manners  and  fine 
poise. 

Five  children  were  born  to  the  home  of  Leigh- 
ton  and  Sophia  Field — Celinda,  Albert,  Clarinda, 
Orinda  and  Adele.  Three  of  these  were  persons 
of  exceptional  endowment,  and  all  of  them  were 
of  superior  characters,  intellectually  and  morally. 
Albert,  the  only  son,  was  a  writer  of  marked  abil- 
ity. For  several  years  he  was  a  paid  contributor 
to  a  number  of  the  larger  newspapers  of  New 
York,  and  some  of  his  magazine  articles  gained 
him  the  local  distinction  of  a  promising  author  of 
certain  future  fame.  Unfortunately  he  died  be- 
fore he  became  fully  mature,  too  young  to  have 
achieved  any  very  pronounced  literary  success. 
Clarinda  was  another  talented  member  of  the  fam- 
ily. Her  tastes  were  scientific.  She  made  astron- 
omy her  specialty,  devoting  the  spare  time  of  her 
life  to  the  study  and  research  work  of  that  science. 
Soon  after  her  graduation  from  school  she  married 
Edward  J.  Richards  and  became  the  mother  of  four 
children,  three  sons  and  one  daughter.  None  of 
her  offspring,  however,  lived  to  reach  adult  life  ex- 
cept her  daughter,  Adele,  who  is  now  living  in  Al- 
bany, New  York,  the  wife  of  Mr.  H.  A.  Fisher. 


Page   Twenty-Six 


CHAPTER  TWO 
Early  Environment;  Character  and  Personality. 

EAST  RODMAN,  the  birthplace  of  Miss  Fielde, 
was,  and  still  is,  a  small  village  of  Jefferson 
County  in  the  northern  part  of  the  State  of 
New  York.  When  the  subject  of  this  biography 
was  five  years  old  her  parents  removed  with  their 
family  to  South  Rutland,  then  called  Tylersville, 
which  was  about  five  miles  distant,  in  the  same 
county.  Both  towns  are  situated  in  the  valley  of 
Sandy  Creek,  a  glacial  erosion,  through  which  the 
waters  drained  from  the  surrounding  hills  course 
westward  to  Lake  Ontario.  South  Rutland,  where 
Miss  Fielde  made  her  home  until  her  twenty-fifth 
year,  is  a  larger  and  commercially  a  more  important 
place  than  East  Rodman.  Though  its  chief  source 
of  dependence  is  its  retail  trade  with  a  rich  agri- 
cultural district,  it  possessed  in  1 845  a  woolen  mill, 
several  small  manufacturing  shops,  a  tannery  and 
an  ashery.  Besides  this  it  was  something  of  a  cul- 
tural center.  Here  was  maintained  a  common 
school,  a  town  hall  and  a  union  church,  the  latter 
being  the  common  place  of  worship  for  the  Bap- 
tists, Methodists  and  Universalists. 

Obviously  the  citizens  of  South  Rutland  were  ex- 

Page    Twenty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ceptionally  liberal  in  their  sectarian  convictions, 
and,  undoubtedly,  any  other  religious  denomina- 
tion besides  those  enumerated  might  have  had  the 
use  of  the  church  edifice  if  desired,  except  the  Ro- 
man Catholic.  It  is  a  matter  of  record  that  the  com- 
munity was  not  so  tolerant  of  Catholicism.  The 
inhabitants  were  largely  made-up  of  the  descend- 
ants of  the  Puritan  colonists,  and  even  at  that  com- 
paratively late  day,  the  prejudice  against  the  Cath- 
olic religion  was  just  as  pronounced  as  in  the  time 
when  flame  and  faggot  were  popular  means  of 
adjusting  differences  of  doctrinal  opinion. 

In  early  life  Miss  Fielde  affiliated  with  the  Uni- 
versalists,  though  her  parents  and  other  members 
of  the  family  were  Baptists.  At  that  period  in  her 
career  she  was  strongly  sectarian,  strict  in  the  per- 
formance of  her  church  duties,  faithfully  attentive 
to  the  prescribed  doctrinal  observances  and  eagerly 
responsive  to  the  neighborhood  prejudice  against 
Catholicism.  This  latter  feeling  was  the  most  dif- 
ficult of  them  all  to  overcome  in  later  life,  persist- 
ing long  after  she  had  freed  herself  from  the  nar- 
rowing influence  of  creed  and  had  discontinued 
the  performance  of  the  rites  and  ceremonies  of  Pro- 
testant usage.  A  small  incident  in  her  middle  life 
serves  to  illustrate  this  unhappy  heritage  as  well 
as  a  more  interesting  phase  of  her  character. 

Page   Twenty-Eight 


Early  Environment;   Character  and  Personality 

While  attending  an  institution  of  applied  bio- 
logy in  the  East,  one  of  her  preceptors  was  a  man 
whom  she  herself  pronounced  "delightful."  He 
was  a  profound  scientist,  a  gentleman  of  advanced 
culture  and  a  Roman  Catholic.  In  their  apprecia- 
tion of  literature,  paintings,  sculpture,  music  and 
the  drama,  teacher  and  pupil  were  of  equal  devel- 
opment and  of  sympathetic  tastes;  from  which 
grew  a  strong  and  enduring  friendship.  But  they 
could  not  agree  in  matters  of  creed.  Early  in  their 
association,  the  professor  caught  notes  of  her  pre- 
judice against  Catholicism  and  in  their  daily  con- 
verse often  tried  to  soften  it  by  representing  the 
ancient  faith  in  its  better  and  brighter  lights.  Un- 
fortunately she  mistook  his  purpose  for  an  attempt 
to  convert  her  to  his  own  religious  views,  and  not 
unfrequently  became  bitter  and  sarcastic  in  resent- 
ing these  supposed  efforts. 

One  day,  as  the  professor  himself  told  the  writer 
hereof,  she  came  into  his  class  room  somewhat  lat- 
er than  usual.  After  the  customary  exchange  of 
greetings,  she  said  abruptly: 

"Dr. ,  do  you  know  where  I  have  been?'* 

"No,  Miss  Fielde,"  he  answered,  noticing  that 
she  was  not  in  a  pleasant  mood,  "I  do  not  know 
where  you  have  been." 

"Well!"   she   resumed,    "I   have   been   to   your 

Page   Twenty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

church ;  and  I  have  witnessed  the  'Elevation  of  the 
Host/  During  the  performance  I  could  not  help 
but  wonder  if,  in  the  light  of  the  twentieth  century 
civilization,  such  an  exhibition  of  superstition 
could  possibly  appeal  to  the  reverential  in  man." 

The  professor  wisely  refrained  from  making  any 
immediate  response,  .ostensibly  applying  himself 
to  some  research  work  before  him,  but  in  reality 
he  planned  to  administer  a  rebuke  that  he  thought 
would  have  a  salutary  and  lasting  effect. 

After  a  time  he  left  the  building;  went  out  on 
the  street ;  returning  in  the  course  of  an  hour.  On 
entering  their  study  room,  he  addressed  her  using 
the  same  rhetorically  abhorrent  form  of  speech  of 
which  she  had  been  guilty. 

"Miss  Fielde,"  he  began;  "do  you  know  where 
I  have  been?" 

By  this  time  Miss  Fielde  had  recovered  from  her 
irritability  and,  perhaps,  was  repenting  her  earlier 
rudeness. 

"No,   Dr. ,"   she  replied;    "I   do  not  know 

where  you  have  been." 

"Well!"  he  continued,  "I  have  been  to  m$ 
church  and  on  my  knees  I  have  prayed  my  Lord  to 
forgive  you  for  the  insult  you  offered  Him." 

It  was  her  turn  to  remain  silent  and  absorbed 
for  a  while,  which  she  did.  Later  in  the  day  she, 

Page  Thirty 


Early  Environment;   Character  and  Personality 

too,    disappeared;    returning    after    a    time    quite 
meek  and  subdued. 

"Dr. ,"  she  said,  again  reverting  to  the  ob- 
jectionable petitio  principftii,  "do  you  know 
where  I  have  been?" 

"No,  Miss  Fielde;  I  do  not." 

"Well,  I  have  been  to  your  church,  and  on  my 
knees  have  prayed  our  Lord  to  forgive  me  for  the 
wicked  insult  I  offered  you" 

Miss  Fielde  was  not  a  handsome  child,  nor  did 
her  personal  appearance  improve  as  she  grew  old- 
er. She  had  a  very  large  head,  masculine  in  its 
proportions,  and  her  features  were  decidedly  irre- 
gular. At  first  sight  she  impressed  one  as  being 
positively  homely;  but  her  looks  improved  as  ac- 
quaintance with  her  became  more  extended.  Her 
face  was  singularly  expressive,  seldom  in  repose, 
and  in  moments  of  inspirational  excitement  it  re- 
flected the  grandeur  of  her  character  to  such  an  ex- 
tent that  it  was  exceptionally  attractive.  She  pos- 
sessed that  attribute  commonly  described  as 
"charm,"  which,  perhaps,  was  the  chief  source  of 
her  power  in  controlling  the  semi-savage  people 
with  whom  she  lived  so  many  years ;  and  the  secret 
of  her  leadership  among  those  of  the  most  advanc- 
ed civilization  and  highest  culture. 

In  form  she  was  large  and  stout.     When  fully 

Page   Thirty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

grown  she  was  about  five-feet-six-inches  in  height 
and  during  the  whole  of  her  life  she  was  af- 
flicted with  a  superabundance  of  adipose  tissue. 
She  nearly  always  enjoyed  the  best  of  health,  was 
strong,  enduring  and  athletic.  She  lived  much  out- 
of-doors,  being  fond  of  horseback  riding,  boating 
and  walking;  but  despite  her  several  forms  of  con- 
stant exercise,  to  use  her  own  words,  she  never 
succeeded  in  reducing  her  figure  to  anything  ap- 
proaching the  approved  standards  of  gentility.  Her 
rotundity  was  a  source  of  annoyance  to  her  as  well 
as  a  subject  of  self-ridicule.  Nor  was  she  adverse 
to  being  made  the  object  of  a  little  fun-making  on 
the  part  of  others.  In  one  of  her  letters  she  de- 
scribed as  amusing  occurence  that  took  place  on 
the  ship  'W.  B.  Palmer"  while  on  her  first  voyage 
to  the  Orient.  A  delegation  of  her  fellow  pas- 
sengers had  solemnly  requested  her  not  to  appear 
on  deck  while  the  ship  was  passing  the  Solomon 
Islands  for  fear  of  exciting  the  appetites  of  a  horde 
of  cannibals,  which  had  assembled  on  a  near-by 
beach. 

According  to  a  recent  newspaper  article  by  Mrs. 
Adaline  M.  Payne,  now  of  Nevada,  Iowa,  who  was 
Miss  Fielde's  first  school  teacher  when  they  both 
lived  in  South  Rutland,  Miss  Fielde  was  an  ex- 
cellent scholar.  She  easily  led  the  South  Rutland 

Pagre  Thirty-Two 


MRS.    ADELINE    M.    PAYNE.    EDITOR    OF    THE    REPRESENTA- 
TIVE,  NEVADA,   IOWA,   MISS   FIELDE'S   FIRST   TEACHER 


Early  Environment;   Character  and  Personality 

school  in  her  desire  to  learn,  as  well  as  in  educa- 
tional achievement.  She  completed  the  course  of 
the  South  Rutland  school  and  was  graduated  from 
an  institution  of  higher  learning  in  an  adjoining 
township  before  she  reached  her  sixteenth  year. 
While  at  this  latter  place  she  was  a  fellow  pupil  of 
M.  A.  Reed,  at  present  a  United  States  senator  from 
the  State  of  Missouri.  In  response  to  a  newspaper 
interview  regarding  Miss  Fielde's  death,  at  the  time 
of  that  occurrence,  Senator  Reed  said:  '*!  remem- 
ber Miss  Fielde  as  a  serious,  meditative  girl,  who 
seemed  to  care  little  for  social  life  and  much  for  her 
books;  although  never  lacking  in  friendliness,  and 
always  having  a  greeting  that  was  pleasant  and  re- 
sponsive.*' 

After  completing  her  full  common  school  course 
of  study,  Miss  Fielde  was  eager  to  continue  her  edu- 
cational career  at  the  State  Normal  College  at  Al- 
bany ;  but  there  were  obstacles  in  the  way  that  pre- 
vented her  from  at  once  carrying  that  plan  into  ef- 
fect. In  those  early  days  there  were  no  public 
schools,  and  compulsory  education  was  un thought 
of.  As  a  rule  the  school  buildings  were  owned  by 
the  community  in  the  rural  districts,  but  the  teach- 
er's salary,  heating  and  lighting  and  other  inciden- 
tal expenses,  were  paid  by  assessing  each  pupil  a 
proportional  share  of  the  whole  cost  of  maintaining 

Page    Thirty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

the  school,  which  was  usually  collected  monthly. 
Leighton  Field's  income  was  small  and  his  em- 
ployment uncertain.  He  had  a  large  family  to  sup- 
port and  educate.  The  money  he  was  obliged  to  ap- 
propriate from  his  slender  means  was  a  constant 
drain  upon  his  resources,  and  had  been  for  years. 
Adele  was  his  youngest  child  and  when  it  came  her 
turn  to  go  to  college  the  family  purse  was  too  near- 
ly exhausted  to  be  equal  to  the  proposed  demand. 
She  was  very  much  disappointed,  but  wasted  no 
time  in  bewailing  her  fate.  Instead,  she  went  to 
work  to  earn  the  money.  This  she  succeeded  in 
doing  in  three  years  by  teaching  school.  It  is  said 
of  her  that  she  gave  general  satisfaction  as  a  teacher 
of  the  primary  schools  where  she  taught  and  receiv- 
ed the  highest  salary  for  her  services  ever  before 
paid  to  a  woman  teacher.  This  latter  condition 
was  probably  due  to  her  innate  thrift  and  superior 
business  abilities.  She  was  a  strong  believer  in  the 
proverb  that  "the  laborer  is  worthy  of  his  hire."  In 
all  business  transactions  she  invariably  gave  and 
always  demanded  just  equivalents,  and  seldom  fail- 
ed to  exact  full  compensation  for  her  work.  Dur- 
ing the  whole  of  her  adult  life  her  earnings  were 
comparatively  large.  She  always  lived  comfort- 
ably, spending  liberally  of  her  means  for  travel, 
books,  public  entertainments  and  for  educational 

Pag-e    Thirty-Four 


Early  Environment;  Character  and  Personality 

purposes;  and  it  is  safe  to  assert  that  fully  one-half 
of  her  income  was  given  to  charity  and  for  the  ad- 
vancement of  social  welfare  projects ;  yet  her  ledger 
nearly  always  showed  a  balance  to  her  credit  every 
year  until  she  reached  the  age  of  seventy.  At  that 
time  she  systematically  refused  to  work  for  pay  or 
to  engage  in  any  enterprise  with  a  view  of  gaining 
a  profit. 

Another  interesting  member  of  the  Field  family 
was  Mrs.  Field's  father,  "Grandfather  Tiffany,** 
who  was  very  old,  but  who  lived  until  Miss  Fielde 
was  ten  years  of  age.  He  had  served  as  a  soldier 
in  the  war  of  the  American  Revolution,  and,  in  the 
later  years  of  his  life  was  a  reliable  resource  for  the 
entertainment  of  his  grandchildren  because  of  the 
stories  he  told  of  that  historic  struggle. 

Because  of  this  ancestor,  and  probably  many 
others,  Miss  Fielde  was  eligible  to  membership  in 
various  patriotic  societies,  the  privilege  of  which 
she  never  could  be  pursuaded  to  avail  herself. 
While  quite  proud  of  her  patriotic  ancestry,  she  was 
not  at  all  sanguine  of  pleasure  or  profit  to  be  de- 
rived from  membership  in  organizations  of  such 
pronounced  exclusiveness.  In  her  lectures  on 
"Reasons  for  a  Coterie,**  she  defines  her  attitude 
on  this  subject  as  follows: 

"Social   congeniality   depends   on    similarity   of 

Page    Thirty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

aesthetic  and  ethical  standards.  It  is  true  that,  just 
as  we  have  the  inalienable  right  to  protect  our- 
selves from  unpleasant  odors,  harsh  noises,  and 
other  physical  nuisances,  we  have  also  the  right  to 
secure  ourselves  against  ungentle  and  ungrammati- 
cal  speech,  uncouth  manners  and  unworthy  ideas. 
We  have  the  right  to  establish  for  ourselves  certain 
standards  of  behavior,  and  to  admit  to  our  social 
circle  only  those  persons  whose  standards  are  like 
our  own.  It  is  only  through  the  maintenance  of 
correct  standards  of  taste  and  action,  and  the  strict 
exclusion  of  all  non-con  formers  from  our  homes, 
that  society  reaches  any  high  degree  of  gentle 
breeding.  Consorting  with  congenial  spirits  is  the 
acme  of  earthly  enjoyment,  and  every  effort  to  at- 
tain this  consortation  is  an  effort  to  gain  the  best 
that  the  world  affords. 

"But  coteries  founded  on  place  of  birth,  national 
preferences  or  convictional  prejudice,  ignore  the 
fundamental  bases  for  congeniality.  They  tend  to 
narrow  the  mental  horizon,  and  to  limit  the  sphere 
of  social  delight.  Congenial  souls  come  to  us  from 
all  points  of  the  compass,  and  from  diverse  lines 
of  parentage.  Valuable  human  beings,  like  the  won- 
derful floral  creations  of  Luther  Burbank,  often 
appear  as  sports  upon  their  genealogical  trees.  To 
fail  of  including  them  within  one's  acquaintances 
would  be  a  personal  calamity.  They  are  not  classi- 
fied under  ordinary  titles,  and  they  would  be  wholly 
unknown  to  the  systematist.  I  have  friends  in 
many  countries,  and  among  the  most  exquisite  of 

Page  Thirty-Six 


Early  Environment;   Character  and  Personality 

body  and  soul,  I  reckon  a  high  caste  Hindu  lady;  a 
Chinese  peasant's  daughter;  the  wife  of  a  Russian 
tanner;  and  an  Irish  nurse. 

*' We  are  not  yet  acquainted  with  the  forces  that 
produce  the  highest  order  of  human  creatures. 
Schools  and  courts  are  useful  educators,  and  their 
work  upon  the  individual  that  they  discipline  is  not 
to  be  under-estimated.  But,  after  all,  it  is  what  the 
individual  is,  not  the  process  by  which  he  has  been 
evolved,  that  we  need  to  consider  in  admission  to 
our  coterie.  A  scheme  of  existence  that  allures  to 
oneself  the  largest  social  satisfaction,  is  better  than 
allegiance  to  a  locality  or  to  a  lineage.  It  therefore 
seems  that  all  coteries  in  which  eligibility  to  mem- 
bership is  based  upon  anything  other  than  congeni- 
ality, that  is,  upon  ethical  and  aesthetic  standards, 
would  be  likely  to  deprive  the  member  of  more 
valuable  friendships  than  the  coterie  could  pro- 
vide." 

Miss  Fielde  left  the  home  of  her  childhood  to  go 
abroad  in  1865,  never  again  to  return  except  for 
an  occasional  visit.  Her  last  trip  to  South  Rutland 
was  made  in  the  spring  of  1 895,  when  she  went  to 
supervise  the  work  of  placing  a  memorial  to  her 
parents  in  the  little  cemetery,  where  repose  their 
remains  besides  those  of  their  son,  Albert.  The 
substantial  shaft,  erected  on  that  occasion,  bears 
two  inscriptions.  One  of  them  reads  **Leighton 
Field,  died  December  28th,  1878,  aged  84  years;" 

Page    Thirty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

the  other,  "Sophia  Tiffany  Field,  His  Wife;   died 
November  9th,   1880;  aged  87  years." 

In  191  1,  Miss  Fielde  wrote  to  Mrs.  Adaline  M. 
Payne;  her  letter  contained  the  following  com- 
ments regarding  the  place  where  both  she  and  her 
correspondent  spent  the  earlier  portions  of  their 
lives  : 

"Not  unfrequently  in  my  sleeping  dreams  I  start 
from  my  father's  house  in  Tylersville  and,  just  as  I 
really  did  in  my  earlier  years,  walk  a  mile  to  visit 
my  grandmother  on  the  Maltby  Hill.  I  note  each 
house  as  I  pass  it,  and  your  father's  house  is  a  land- 
mark denoting  about  a  third  of  the  way,  and  some 
of  the  inmates  are  seen  about  the  place.  Then  I  go 
on  to  the  thornapple  tree  and  across  the  bridge  over 
Sandy  Creek  and  up  the  hill,  till  I  smell  the  lilacs  or 
the  Balm-of-Gilead  trees  in  my  grandmother's  door- 
yard.  I  know  the  thickest  turf-spots  on  that  road 
and  every  curve  of  the  creek,  and  the  view  of  each 
winding  of  the  highway.  My  feet  have  traveled 
far  since  then;  but  I  doubt  if  a  tour  around  the 
world  would  now  appear  to  me  to  be  of  fuller  or 
more  thrilling  incidents  than  did  that  walk  of  a  mile 
when  I  was  but  a  few  years  old,  and  had  never  been 
more  than  ten  miles  from  my  birth-place.  You 
have  lately  been  back  to  those  old  scenes;  I  do  not 
think  I  could  now  bear  the  stress  of  a  return  to 
them.  The  things  that  are  no  more  wrack  one  too 
severely." 

Page   Thirty-Eight 


CHAPTER  THREE 
Character  and  Personality — Continued 

TO  properly  describe  Miss  Fielde's  personality 
and  correctly  analyze  her  character  is  a  some- 
what pretentious  undertaking.  The  things 
that  were  most  prominent  in  her  career  were  her 
altruism,  her  earnestness,  her  steadfastness  and  her 
orderliness.  In  every  undertaking,  her  first  thought 
was  to  pre-estimate  the  measure  of  good  to  be  at- 
tained. Her  next  concern  was  the  probability  of 
success.  Every  proposition  must  stand  the  test 
of  her  foresight  and  the  application  of  her  reason. 
An  illustration  of  this  habit  may  be  seen  in  an  in- 
cident of  several  years  ago.  A  plan  affecting  a 
matter  of  supposedly  vital  importance  had  been 
submitted  to  her,  of  which  the  initiators  were  en- 
thusiastically confident  of  good  results.  Miss 
Fielde  said:  'This  seems  good;  but  let  us  care- 
fully examine  the  ground  we  will  have  to  traverse. 
We  must  look  ahead  to  the  finish  as  well  as  see 
the  beginning.  We  want  to  be  sure  that  there 
are  stepping  stones  all  the  way  which  we  may  use 
if  we  reach  a  marshy  place.  To  be  swamped  or 
compelled  to  retrace  our  steps  would  be  neither 
wise  nor  profitable.*' 

But   once   a   project   seemed   "wise   and   profit- 
Page  Thirty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

able,"  she  pushed  forward  with  a  determination  of 
will  and  energy  that  brooked  no  opposition.  In 
commenting  on  this  phase  of  her  character,  Rev. 
William  K.  McKibben,  one  of  her  colleagues  in 
missionary  service,  wrote  of  her: 

"You  who  have  known  the  determination,  en- 
ergy and  persistency  which  characterized  her  ac- 
tivities in  America,  for  instance  in  the  cause  of 
equal  suffrage,  or  in  the  prohibition  crusade,  can 
well  imagine  what  it  must  have  been  in  the  Orient, 
in  her  younger  days.  If  there  were  obstacles  they 
must  be  overcome.  If  houses,  churches  or  schools 
were  needed  they  had  to  be  provided  in  some  way. 
With  her,  as  with  Napoleon,  there  must  be  no  Alps. 
Circumstances,  in  her  etymology,  were  but  things 
that  were  to  be  made  to  stand  around.  Sight  once 
gained  of  some  end,  it  must  be  reached;  by  sheer 
weight  of  mind  and  fixity  of  purpose  she  pushed 
her  way  through  until  the  goal  was  won." 

Not  only  was  Miss  Fielde  determined  and  per- 
sistent, but,  it  must  be  confessed,  she  was  likewise 
positive.  Once  she  felt  that  she  was  right  her  opin- 
ions became  fixed.  She  must  be  absolutely  con- 
vinced of  error  before  it  was  possible  for  her  to 
change  her  views  or  reform  her  attitude  once  es- 
tablished. But  withal  she  was  tolerant  of  every 
other  person's  opinion  and  attitude.  Some  time 
ago,  a  lady  who  belonged  to  a  social  organization 

Page  Forty 


Character  and  Personality 

of  which  Miss  Fielde  was  an  active  member,  wrote 
of  this  characteristic: 

"We  talk,  discuss  and  argue  a  proposition  until 
the  matter  seems  exhausted;  and,  in  the  end,  Miss 
Fielde  rises  with  her  'queen-mother'  air  and  re- 
duces us  all  to  silence.  Her  decisions  are  so  abso- 
lutely final  that  often  we  have  difficulty  in  becom- 
ing resigned.  On  one  occasion,  when  we  had  been 
thoroughly  squelched,  a  member,  who  was  still  de- 
fiant, remarked  in  an  undertone:  'Well,  there  is 
nothing  else  for  us  to  do  but  to  wait  for  a  rainy 
day  and  then  change  the  constitution.*  ' 

"The  allusion  to  a  "rainy  day"  referred  to  Miss 
Fielde' s  practice  of  wisely  remaining  under  the 
shelter  of  her  own  home  when  meeting  days  were 
stormy  or  the  weather  otherwise  inclement.  At 
this  time  she  was  seventy-five  years  old  and  her 
physical  health  was  such  that  caution  was  neces- 
sary on  her  part. 

It  was  not  to  be  inferred  from  the  foregoing  that 
Miss  Fielde  was  in  any  sense  timid.  On  the  con- 
trary, she  was  absolutely  unafraid.  During  her  ca- 
reer she  survived  three  typhoons  that  had  strewn 
miles  of  the  Chinese  coast  with  the  debris  of 
wrecked  vessels;  had  faced  a  Chinese  mob,  which 
threatened  her  with  a  violent  death ;  had  taken  part 
in  an  elephant  hunt  in  Siam,  where  several  of  the 
other  participants  had  been  killed  or  maimed;  had 

Page  Forty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

encountered  the  dangers  of  the  stormy  seas,  swift- 
running  streams,  wild  animals  and  savage  men  of 
Alaska,  at  a  period  when  travel  in  that  country 
was  thought  an  even  game  of  chance  with  death; 
and  if  she  ever  experienced  the  sensation  of  fear, 
neither  history  nor  tradition  has  furnished  an  ac- 
count of  it. 

A  woman  friend  of  the  writer  recently  described 
Miss  Fielde's  wonderful  nerve  control  under  very 
exciting  circumstances,  when  bodily  injury  seemed 
possible  and  arrest  and  imprisonment  probable.  Ac- 
cording to  the  lady's  story,  she  and  Miss  Fielde  at- 
tended a  meeting  of  the  Industrial  Workers  of 
the  World,  at  a  period  when  that  organization  was 
at  the  acme  of  its  trouble-making. 

"We  had  no  sooner  became  seated,"  she  said, 
"when  a  dispute  arose  over  the  selection  of  a  chair- 
man. There  were  several  hundred  men  and  women 
present;  in  a  moment  all  of  them  were  on  their 
feet,  savagely  howling  and  shouting  threats.  Many 
of  them  shook  their  fists  and  swung  their  canes, 
while  others  searched  their  pockets  for  more  ef- 
fective weapons.  The  lights  were  turned  out,  leav- 
ing the  place  in  total  darkness;  and  a  riot  call  was 
sent  in  to  police  headquarters. 

"Miss  Fielde!"  I  screamed,  trying  to  raise  my 
voice  above  the  tumult,  "let's  get  out  of  here." 

Pago    Forty-Two 


Character  and  Personality 

"No,  no!"  she  answered;  "this  is  so  interesting. 
Let  us  stay  and  see  what  else  they  do." 

Miss  Fielde  was  a  genuine  aristocrat,  at  least  in 
one  sense  of  that  often  misapplied  term.  The  prin- 
ciple of  noblesse  oblige  characterized  her  every 
action.  She  was  naturally  a  leader,  invariably  forg- 
ing ahead  in  every  movement,  blazing  a  trail  so  that 
others  of  less  robust  courage  and  endurance  could 
follow.  And  she  demanded  full  recognition  of  her 
sovereignty.  She  was  never  familiar  with  others, 
not  even  with  her  most  intimate  acquaintances  and 
friends;  and  never  permitted  familiarity  from  oth- 
ers. True,  she  had  a  strong  sense  of  humor,  but  a 
joke  must  be  made  in  perfect  taste,  otherwise  she 
would  not  tolerate  it.  Any  alleged  bon  mot  that 
approached  the  vulgar  was  abhorrent  to  her ;  and  if 
applied  to  her  or  directed  towards  her,  she  resented 
it  in  words  and  manner  that  seemed  a  gift  little 
short  of  inspiration.  In  an  article  written  for  the 
Western  Woman's  Outlook,  September  19,  1912, 
she  gives  her  conception  of  an  aristocrat,  and  the 
moral  and  aesthetic  responsibility  that  attaches  to 
an  individual  who  properly  represents  that  exalted 
social  status.  Parts  of  the  article  are  here  repro- 
duced : 

"Every  nation,  as  well  as  every  individual  in  a 
nation,  cherishes  an  ideal  of  life  as  it  ought  to  be. 

Page   Forty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

That  ideal  moulds  to  a  greater  or  less  degree  the 
conduct  of  the  holder. 

"In  each  of  the  great  religions  a  person  whose 
character  and  behavior  represents  that  of  the  ideal 
man,  claims  the  devotion  of  the  disciple  and  de- 
mands conformity  to  the  example  presented  by  the 
founder.  The  aristocrat  in  each  country  is  nomi- 
nally an  adherent  of  the  accepted  religion.  Support 
of  the  established  religion  is  everywhere  a  social 
function  of  the  aristocrat. 

"The  existence  and  doings  of  a  veritable  aristo- 
crat holds  the  attention  of  other  persons  because 
the  aristocrat  is  supposed  to  live  the  sort  of  life 
that  every  person  would  like  to  live.  The  aristo- 
crat is  looked  upon  as  one  who  holds  in  his  hand 
the  possibilities  necessary  to  the  creation  of  the 
ideal  life,  and  the  observer  is  eager  to  note  the  re- 
sult of  such  holding. 

"When  a  General  Nogi  quits  life  in  order  to  ac- 
company his  Emperor  to  the  land  of  shades  and  con- 
tinue to  serve  him  there,  he  acts  the  ideal  man 
among  his  people.  When  the  Countess  Nogi  delib- 
erately makes  ready  to  accompany  her  husband  in 
the  act  of  fealty  due  to  his  Emperor,  she  behaves 
as  would  the  ideal  woman  of  her  country.  Such  a 
sacrifice  of  self  means  that  aristocracy  in  that  coun- 
try is  potent  in  its  claims  upon  the  souls  of  the 
living.  It  means  that  the  highest  qualities  yet 
evolved  in  the  human  race — chivalry,  fidelity,  high 
sense  of  personal  duty,  correct  private  relationships 
and  lofty  standards  of  public  service  are  preserved 

Page   Forty-Four 


Character  and  Personality 

by  the  men  and  women  of  the  class  to  which  hom- 
age is  paid,  and  that  the  homage  paid  is  that  of 
spiritual  fealty  rather  than  that  of  material  dis- 
play. It  means  that  the  inherent  and  actual  dig- 
nity of  the  aristocrat  furnishes  to  the  nation  a 
standard  that  it  prizes  for  the  measurement  of 
character  and  behavior  for  everyday  use  among  the 
commonality.  The  commonality  can  afford  to  pay 
something  for  such  standards,  and  it  pays  its  hom- 
age, not  with  bitter  jealousy  but  with  reverent 
approval. 

"A  true  aristocracy,  created  by  eugenic  breeding, 
practical  education,  and  divine  leadings,  is  essen- 
tial to  the  advancement  of  any  nation  in  true  civil- 
ization, 

"When  the  class  nominally  highest  becomes  lux- 
urious, pleasure-loving,  inane,  unscrupulous,  the 
upholder  of  the  low  and  false  standards  of  human 
conduct  and  relationships,  its  overthrow  is  at  hand 
and  a  French  Revolution  is  imminent.  When  the 
class,  whose  function  it  is  to  elevate  national 
ideals  becomes  a  byword  and  a  reproach,  the  ob- 
ject of  secret  contempt  and  open  enmity  among 
the  commonality,  the  nation  is  decadent  and  its 
future  is  somber.  The  demoralizing  influence  of 
a  class,  nominally  aristocratic  and  actually  degen- 
erate, is  beyond  compute.  Since  nations  began  to 
be,  the  ideals  of  man,  far  more  influential  upon 
him  than  are  his  usual  ideas,  have  been  formed 
mainly  by  the  privileged  class.  All  below  this 
class  look  up  to  it  to  see  what  it  does  with  its  leis- 

Pag-o   Forty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ure  and  its  appurtenances,  and  inquires  what  is  the 
life  of  those  who  have  power  to  live  as  they  please. 
It  behooves  them  to  live  rightly. 

"The  Countess  Nogi,  at  her  home  in  a  thatched 
house  in  the  suburb,  lived  very  simply,  with  stately 
courtesy  and  gentle  hospitality.  Her  ideal  of  cor- 
rect behavior  may  not  have  been  true  to  the  high- 
est truth  when  she  decided  on  voluntary  death. 
But  her  notions  of  social  duty,  as  evinced  in  her 
demise,  stand  in  sublime  contrast  to  that  of  a 
woman  carrying  a  begemmed  lapdog  to  its  birth- 
day party;  and  we  may  accept  it  as  logical  for  a 
real  aristocrat  in  her  sphere  of  Oriental  life.  She 
had  lowered  no  ideal  of  the  commonality." 

A  summary  of  Miss  Fielde' s  character  and  per- 
sonality could  be  made  from  the  following  analysis 
and  classification:  Her  intellectual  faculties  were 
evenly  developed  to  a  rare  degree  of  advancement ; 
morally  she  was  a  Christian;  politically,  a  demo- 
crat; generally  described,  she  was  intensely  hu- 
man. In  commenting  upon  her  fine  intellectual 
endowments,  Dr.  Edward  J.  Nolan,  secretary  of  the 
Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  of  Philadelphia, 
makes  this  statement: 

"I  never  knew  a  better  balanced  human  being. 
Her  capacity  for  making  warm  personal  friends 
of  everyone  she  cared  to  associate  with  (which  was 
not  by  any  means  everybody) ,  and  the  ability 

Page  Forty-Six 


Character  and  Personality 

to  find  for  herself  a  definite  sphere  were  extraordi- 
nary." 

Miss  Fielde  believed  absolutely  in  Christianity  as 
the  essential  moral  ideal.  The  practice  of  the 
Christian  principles,  she  thought,  was  the  only  de- 
pendable method  by  which  the  moral  regeneration 
of  humanity  was  to  be  worked  out.  Her  democ- 
racy was  the  result  of  intellectual  conviction  rather 
than  a  matter  of  birth  and  national  environment. 
She  made  a  profound  study  of  the  several  social 
systems  of  civilized  nations  and  came  to  look  upon 
a  democracy  as  the  ultima  thule  of  governmental 
evolution.  In  her  opinion  there  were,  really,  but 
two  general  systems  of  social  agreement — frater- 
nal and  paternal.  The  former  has  its  highest  man- 
ifestation in  a  democracy;  an  autocracy  is  the 
primitive  form  of  the  latter.  Socialism,  Syndical- 
ism and  Communism  are  proposed  attempts  to  de- 
velop the  latter  without  change  in  the  fundamental 
principles. 

But  first  of  all  she  was  human.  She  had  a  "de- 
cent respect"  for  the  opinions  of  all  mankind 
whether  those  of  religious  creed  or  political  par- 
tisanship. On  one  occasion  she  said:  "I  am  not 
at  all  afraid  of  Socialism  or  Syndicalism.  I  believe 
it  is  the  duty  of  every  American  to  carefully  in- 
quire into  and  learn  the  causes  why  so  many  of 

Page    Forty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

our  recent  immigrants  prefer  to  cling  to  their  po- 
litical ideals  of  paternalism  instead  of  joining  with 
us  in  the  development  of  our  democracy."  At  one 
time  she  entertained  Joseph  Ettor  after  hearing 
that  individual  deliver  a  lecture,  keeping  him  sev- 
eral hours  while  he  explained  Syndicalism  and  at- 
tempted to  justify  the  practice  of  * 'direct  action" 
and  sabotage.  When  he  left  her  home  he  took 
with  him  a  substantial  present  of  money,  which  he, 
perhaps,  found  convenient  in  the  present  condition 
of  society,  even  if  not  contemplated  as  a  thing  of 
value  in  the  Utopia  of  his  dreams. 

Referring  to  the  exclusively  human  trait  in  Miss 
Fielde's  character,  Mrs.  Charlotte  Perkins  Oilman 
writes  of  her: 

"She  was  a  woman  to  whom  the  word  great  de- 
servedty  applied;  a  great  character,  strong,  wise, 
courageous,  progressive.  I  have  never  known  a 
woman  more  richly  'human.'  There  are  many 
women  sweet  and  good,  even  able  along  certain 
lines,  yet  still  more  feminine  than  human;  just  as 
some  men  are  more  masculine  than  human.  But 
Adele  Fielde  was  a  human  being  as  well  as  a  noble 
woman. 

"Her  life  of  varied  achievement  has  left  her 
best  monument  in  the  hearts  and  minds  of  thou- 
sands whom  she  has  taught  and  helped;  and  bio- 
logical science  is  enriched  by  her  labors. 

Page    Forty-Eight 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

" Besides  all  this  she  was  a  likable*  person,  with 
hosts  of  friends,  and  this  popularity  she  retained 
to  her  latest  years^  Such  a  life  is  an  inspiration  and 
an  example/' 


Page   Forty-Nine 


CHAPTER  FOUR 
A  Psychic  Experience 

EARLY  in  life  Miss  Fielde  had  a  strange  psychic 
experience,  which  was,  apparently,  a  mani- 
festation of  prophecy.  This  experience,  she 
confessed,  made  a  deep  impression  upon  her.  It 
prompted  her  to  give  a  great  deal  of  study  and  time 
to  the  investigation  of  the  several  phases  of  Hindu 
occultism,  Spiritualism  and  Christian  Science. 
And,  while  she  always  seemed  greatly  interested 
in  the  various  activities  of  these  recondite  forces, 
she  invariably  declined  to  express  an  opinion  as  to 
their  source  or  sources  of  power.  She  was,  how- 
ever, inclined  to  regard  all  species  of  mysticism  as 
unimportant  when  compared  with  the  study  and 
research  work  of  the  material  sciences.  It  was  her 
contention  that  the  phenomena  of  the  normal  func- 
tions of  the  soul  were  far  more  wonderful  than  its 
abnormal  manifestations,  and  that  the  study  of  the 
normal  functions  were  far  more  healthful  and  in- 
forming than  an  investigation  of  its  abnormalities. 
However,  Miss  Fielde  was  too  broad-minded  to 
condemn  such  knowledge  as  valueless  because  it 
was  difficult  to  understand  or  because  it  lacked  re- 
sponsiveness to  the  law  of  uniformity.  Actuated 
by  a  general  interest  in  scientific  disclosure  rather 

Page  Fifty 


A  Psychic  Experience 

than  from  a  personal  motive,  in  1 907  she  wrote  an 
account  of  the  psychic  experience  referred  to,  send- 
ing copies  to  Professor  James  H.  Hyslop  and  Sir 
Oliver  Lodge,  the  heads  of  the  American  and  Eng- 
lish Societies  for  Psychical  Research,  respectively. 
In  her  letter  of  instruction  to  these  scientists,  ac- 
companying the  account,  she  stipulated  that  neither 
the  substance  nor  any  printed  discussion  of  her  ex- 
perience should  be  made  public  until  after  her 
death.  Following  is  a  verbatim  account  of  the 
strange  affair  clothed  in  her  own  language,  kindly 
furnished  the  writer  by  Professor  Hyslop: 

"Forty-nine  West  Forty-fourth  Street, 
New  York  City,  N.  Y. 

June  Third,  1907. 

"When  I  was  about  fifteen  years  old,  living  in 
my  father's  house  and  sleeping  in  my  own  bed- 
room, at  Tylersville,  Jefferson  County,  New  York, 
I  had  one  night  a  dream  so  vivid  that  when  I  awoke 
next  morning  it  seemed  to  have  been  an  actual  ex- 
perience. Its  details  have  never  become  blurred  in 
my  memory,  and  during  the  fifty  years  since  I 
dreamed  this  dream,  its  prophetic  character  has  be- 
come overwhelmingly  apparent  to  me.  But  there 
remains  from  it  something  still  unaccomplished, 
and  now  I  write  it  out  in  order  that  my  record  may 
stand  with  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  as 
made  previous  to  a  complete  fulfillment. 

"From  a  dreamless  slumber  I  seemed  to  awaken 

Page   Fifty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

under  high  green  pine  trees  in  a  wide  forest,  where 
the  ground  was  everywhere  flecked  with  sunshine 
and  thickly  carpeted  with  fallen  needles,  upon 
which  I  walked  in  an  undefined  but  certain  path, 
knowing  that  my  fortune  was  soon  to  be  told  to 
me.  Thus  walking  I  came  to  a  log  cabin,  mounted 
a  stair,  and  stood  with  my  back  to  the  single  win- 
dow, in  a  square  room  draped  with  cobwebs.  Its 
only  furniture  was  a  chair  near  the  middle  of  the 
room,  and  upon  this  sat  an  aged  woman  with  deep- 
set  black  eyes,  and  it  was  she  who  knew  my  fortune. 

"She  .wore  a  plain  brown  dress  with  a  "white 
kerchief  crossed  over  the  breast,  and  a  close  white 
cap  tied  under  the  chin.  Her  grey  hair  floated 
thickly  from  under  the  cap.  She  sat  alone  and  mo- 
tionless in  the  still  room,  and  I  stood  silently  before 
her,  while  without  speaking  a  word  she  communi- 
cated to  my  mind  her  knowledge  of  my  future. 

"I  should  live  a  long  and  eventful  life,  solitary 
though  not  isolated.  The  solitariness  would  be 
the  chief  element  in  my  consciousness  and  would 
continue  many,  many  years,  but  thereafter  there 
would  come  to  me  honors  and  uncommon  happi- 
ness. The  chief  happiness  of  my  life  would  be  to- 
wards its  close,  but  the  happiness  would  be  real  and 
would  not  be  brief. 

"Without  speech  I  turned,  went  down  the  stairs, 
back  by  the  path  by  which  I  had  come,  and  when  I 
reached  the  spot  in  the  forest  where  the  dream  be- 
gan, it  there  ceased  and  I  slept. 

"I  have  always  felt  that  this  dream  was  prophet- 

Page    Fifty-Two 


A  Psychic  Experience 

ic;  but  I  am  not  aware  that  it  has  ever  influenced 
my  decisions  or  my  actions.  The  first  part  of  it 
has  proven  true  to  a  degree  so  impressive  that  I 
think  that  the  remainder  of  my  life  will  conform  to 
its  yet  unfulfilled  part.  In  such  case,  it  will  be 
necessary  for  me  to  live  several  years  longer,  per- 
haps a  dozen  or  more.  Something  that  I  do  not 
now  foresee  or  have  reason  to  suspect  must  hap- 
pen; because  the  later  years  of  my  life  were  to  be 
essentially  unlike  its  major  portion,  and  much  more 
happy.  If  the  next  decade  brings  me  uncommon 
honor  and  happiness — or  rather  honorable  happi- 
ness— then  the  dream  was  truly  prophetic.  But  if 
the  next  decade  does  not  bring  me  a  degree  of  hon- 
orable happiness  that  exceeds  anything  I  have  yet 
experiencd,  then  the  dream  fails  of  complete  ful- 
fillment and  is  not  to  be  reckoned  among  curious 
psychic  phenomena. 

"Adele  M.  Fielde." 

The  foregoing  presents  only  a  general  state- 
ment. In  Miss  Fielde's  verbal  account  of  the  ex- 
perience, the  witch  did  not  utter  a  word  during  all 
the  time  she  was  present,  but  seemed  to  communi- 
cate the  "fortune"  subconsciously  by  a  sort  of  pan- 
oramic exhibition.  Every  important  event  that 
was  to  take  place  in  her  career  passed  before  her  in 
review.  She  saw  herself  making  preparations  to 
leave  her  home  and  go  abroad.  She  felt  herself 
crossing  the  stormy  seas  and  experienced  the  sensa- 

Page  Fifty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

tion  of  homesickness  from  being  exiled  in  a  for- 
eign land.  She  witnessed  the  death  of  her  affianced 
husband  and  was  overwhelmed  with  grief  and  de- 
spair. She  experienced  the  reconciliation  that  was 
to  come  from  her  disappointed  hopes  and  pre-de- 
termined  to  "live  less  herself  that  others  might  live 
more  through  her.'*  The  many  bright  spots  that 
were  to  illumine  her  life  were  presented  as  clearly 
as  those  of  darker  color.  In  her  vision  she  saw 
herself  a  successful  teacher,  author,  scientist  and 
social  leader  and  anticipated  all  the  pleasures  of 
gratified  ambition.  The  final  "great  honor,"  re- 
ferred to  in  her  written  account,  came  according  to 
schedule.  In  1914  Miss  Fielde  was  elected  a  Fel- 
low of  the  American  Society  for  the  Advancement 
of  Science  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the  delegates  of 
that  eminent  body  in  Washington,  D.  C. 

This,  indeed,  was  recognition  of  her  great 
achievements  and  fine  character  by  a  truly  high 
source  of  authority.  Membership  in  the  American 
Society  for  the  Advancement  of  Science  is  in  it- 
self a  rare  distinction  and  not  easily  gained.  To 
be  eligible  a  person  must  have  done  something 
worth  while,  distinguished  himself  in  some  field  of 
scientific  research  or  have  been  the  instrument  of 
some  important  scientific  disclosure.  And  how 
much  greater  the  honor  of  being  chosen  a  Fellow? 

Page  Fifty-Four 


A  Psychic  Experience 

In  the  United  States  there  are  several  thousand 
members,  but  comparatively  only  a  few  Fellows. 
The  society  was  organized  in  1 848  and  during  its 
existence  of  seventy  years  only  seventy-three 
women  have  been  elected  Fellows. 

The  passage  of  the  prohibition  amendment  to  the 
Constitution  of  the  State  of  Washington  was  ac- 
knowledged by  Miss  Fielde  to  have  brought  her  the 
greatest  happiness  of  her  life.  It  was  her  belief 
that  the  joy  she  experienced  from  this  source  com- 
pletely fulfilled  the  prophecy  so  strangely  presented 
to  her. 

In  discussing  the  mysterious  affair  shortly  be- 
fore her  death,  Miss  Fielde  expressed  the  opinion 
that  the  incident  was  a  genuine  instance  of  proph- 
ecy, though  she  did  not  regard  it  as  necessarily  a 
supernatural  occurrence.  On  the  other  hand,  she 
was  inclined  to  look  upon  it  as  the  expression  of 
some  unknown  natural  force.  A  force,  she  be- 
lieved, which  some  day  material  science  would  be 
able  satisfactorily  to  explain.  She  thought  the 
time  would  come  when  the  phenomena  of  spirit- 
ism, necromancy,  occultism  and  kindred  powers 
would  be  made  manifest  and,  perhaps,  be  used  for 
the  practical  benefit  of  mankind. 


Page   Fifty-Five 


CHAPTER  FIVE 

Attending  the  Normal  College;   Friendship  With 
Miss  Chilcott;  Engagement  to  Cyrus  Chilcott. 

IN   1858  Miss  Fielde  attended  the  State  Normal 
School  at  Albany,  from  which  she  was  grad- 
uated in    1 860.      Her  college  career  was  not 
marked  by  any  unusual  event;    but  a  friendship 
that  she  formed  while  at  Albany  led  to  what  she  re- 
garded   the    most    important    event    of    her    life. 
It  was  there  she  met  Miss  Lucretia  M.  Chilcott,  who 
was  her  room-mate  and  constant  companion  dur- 
ing the  school  term.     Miss  Chilcott  writes  of  this 
intimacy  as  follows: 

"In  the  month  of  September  of  the  year  1858, 
Dell  and  I  went  to  Albany  to  attend  the  State  Nor- 
mal School,  she  from  Watertown,  Jefferson  Coun- 
ty, I  from  Buffalo,  Erie  County.  We  both  wished 
to  rent  rooms  and  board  ourselves.  The  day  of  our 
arrival  was  Saturday,  she  got  there  in  the  morn- 
ing, I  in  the  afternoon.  She  had  been  assigned  to 
a  room  and  I  being  sent  to  the  same  room  found  her 
lying  on  the  bed  crying  with  homesickness.  It  was 
a  dismal,  rainy  afternoon,  one  of  those  days  that 
requires  heroism  to  be  cheerful,  but  strangers  as 
we  were,  an  immediate  bond  of  sympathy  was 
created  and  we  became  -warm  friends  and  remained 
together  until  we  graduated. 

"She  was  a  close  student  and  was  very  popular 

Page  Fifty-Six 


Engagement  to  Cyrus  Chilcott 

with  both  teachers  and  pupils  but  her  close  applica- 
tion to  her  lessons  did  not  prevent  her  enjoyment 
of  the  humorous  side  of  school  life  as  the  follow- 
ing incident  will  illustrate: 

"We  were  all  especially  fond  of  one  teacher,  who 
excelled  in  everything  but  discipline.  One  day 
with  the  manner  of  care-free  scholars  we  started  to 
laugh  at  something  ridiculous  and  prolonged  the 
merriment  unduly.  Dell  was  requested  to  change 
her  seat  to  one  near  the  stove.  She  acquiesed  grace- 
fully, pretending  that  she  was  cold,  and  that  this 
seat  was  the  one  she  most  desired.  She  carried 
this  ruse  successfully  until  her  face  became  as  red 
as  a  lobster,  at  which  the  teacher  and  class  became 
convulsed  with  laughter. 

"At  the  time  we  became  room-mates,  she  was  a 
Universalist  and  I  was  a  Baptist.  We  agreed  that 
we  would  not  argue  on  religious  subjects,  but  if  one 
could  convince  the  other  by  her  life  that  she  had 
the  truth,  or  a  clearer  conception  of  it  than  the 
other,  that  would  be  her  privilege." 

In  a  recent  visit  to  New  York  City,  the  writer 
hereof  met  and  enjoyed  a  conversation  with  Mrs. 
Sarah  Magill,  one  of  Miss  Fielde's  intimate  friends. 
Mrs.  Magill  was  a  student  at  the  Albany  Normal 
College,  and  was  graduated  therefrom  the1  year1 
after  Miss  Fielde  finished.  In  speaking  of  Miss 
Fielde's  college  career,  Mrs.  Magill  said:  "Miss 
Fielde  was  an  exceptionally  good  student,  highly 

Page   Fifty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

creditable  to  the  school.  While  at  the  institution 
she  manifested  all  of  the  qualities  of  superiority 
that  distinguished  her  later.  She  was  orderly  in 
thought  and  action,  always  had  her  essay  ready, 
and  was,  perhaps,  called  on  for  public  recitals  often- 
er  than  any  of  the  other  students  because  of  her 
pronounced  literary  talents." 

Miss  Fielde  was  in  her  twenty-second  year 
when  she  was  graduated  from  the  Normal.  Imme- 
diately after,  she  resumed  teaching,  perhaps  with  the 
intention  of  making  pedagogy  her  life's  calling.  At 
first  she  taught  at  Watertown  and  later  on  at  Ma- 
maroneck,  New  York.  At  Watertown  she  made  a 
record  for  fine  service  and  unusual  efficiency.  By  in- 
troducing and  applying  methods  of  her  own  initia- 
tion, she  is  said  to  have  gained  so  strong  a  hold  on 
the  affections  of  her  pupils  that  she  had  perfect 
control  of  them  and  to  have  so  stimulated  their 
class  ambition  that  the  advances  made  in  the  de- 
partments over  which  she  presided  were  unprece- 
dently  great. 

While  teaching  at  Mamaroneck  an  occurrence 
came  to  pass  that  changed  the  entire  current  of  her 
life.  While  on  her  way  to  her  home  at  Watertown, 
at  the  commencement  of  the  school  vacation  in 
1 864,  she  stopped  at  Buffalo  to  visit  her  friend  and 
former  schoolmate,  Miss  Lucretia  Chilcott.  Miss 

Page   Fifty-Eight 


MISS    FIELDE    IN    1864 


Engagement  to  Cyrus  Chilcott 

Chilcott's  brother,  Cyrus  Chilcott,  at  that  time  was 
at  home  preparing  to  go  as  a  missionary  to  the  Chin- 
ese at  Bangkok,  Siam.  Shortly  before  the  meet- 
ing he  had  completed  his  course  of  study  at  the 
Rochester  Theological  Seminary  and  been  ordain- 
ed a  Baptist  minister  at  Fredonia,  New  York.  Miss 
Chilcott  describes  the  meeting  of  Miss  Fielde  with 
her  brother  as  follows: 

"It  was  love  at  first  sight  with  both  of  them.  Of 
course  they  had  known  of  each  other  through  me 
for  years,  but  had  never  met  till  then." 

Miss  Fielde  was  a  person  of  intense  affections 
and  her  desire  for  love  was  equally  strong.  She 
was  fitted  by  nature  for  wifehood  and  motherhood 
and  to  be  a  wife  and  mother  was  the  chief  ambition 
of  her  life.  Because  of  her  humble  home-surround- 
ings, heretofore  she  had  not  come  into  social  con- 
tact with  anyone  of  the  opposite  sex  who  would 
make  a  suitable  matrimonial  match  for  a  woman 
of  her  superior  endowment ;  and  already  her  friends 
began  to  regard  her  as  a  "confirmed  old  maid." 

In  one  respect  she  was  peculiar,  if  not  somewhat 
contradictory.  Although  of  world-wide  sympathies 
and  genuinely  democratic,  she  was  exceedingly 
choice  of  the  selection  of  her  intimate  friends.  No 
human  being  was  too  insignificant  or  too  humble 
for  whom  she  would  not  make  any  reasonable  self- 
Page  Fifty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

sacrifice;  but  she  positively  would  not  permit  her- 
self to  be  bored  by  the  companionship  of  mediocre 
or  commonplace  individuals.  As  a  consequence 
she  was  very  much  alone  in  early  life;  and  not  at 
all  popular  with  persons  of  either  sex.  However, 
she  was  very  fond  of  taking  part  in  social  gather- 
ings. She  was  a  brilliant  conversationalist,  an  ap- 
preciative listener,  a  person  of  exquisite  manners, 
and  possessed  a  strong  sense  of  humor.  Also  she 
was  deeply  averse  to  anything  that  partook  of  the 
nature  of  a  practical  joke — to  anything  that  tend- 
ed to  make  a  human  being  seem  ridiculous.  Pos- 
sibly this  latter  feeling  may  have  disqualified  her 
in  a  measure  from  a  whole-hearted  participation  in 
the  primitive  pleasures  of  her  girlhood  days,  and  to 
have  been  partly  responsible  for  her  lack  of  suc- 
cess as  a  social  factor  at  that  period  of  her  life. 

Miss  Fielde  was  an  intense  lover  of  humanity,  if 
not  especially  a  respecter  of  individual  persons. 
To  her,  human  dignity,  in  its  true  sense,  was  a 
source  of  genuine  pride ;  something  to  be  cherished 
and  maintained — something  sacred.  That  "man 
was  made  in  the  image  of  his  Maker,"  was  a  thought 
that  impressed  her  above  all  others ;  and,  in  reality, 
was  the  one  that  exerted  the  dominant  moral  influ- 
ence upon  her  whole  career.  An  idea  of  her  regard 
for  mankind,  and  her  only  conception  of  social  dif- 

Page  Sixty 


Engagement  to  Cyrus  Chilcott 

ferences,  may  be  gained  from  a  remark  she  once 
made  in  all  earnestness,  but  the  expression  of  which 
•was  leavened  by  a  touch  of  humor.  "The  twice- 
born,"  she  said,  "are  largely  engaged  in  trying  to 
eliminate  the  evils  of  this  world;  a  world  created 
by  a  God  that  loves  righteousness  and  hates  in- 
iquity. It  is  really  more  alluring  to  me  to  work 
with  the  twice-born  than  to  repose  under  a  Bo  tree. 
But  I  admit  that  a  graceful  attitude  under  a  Bo 
tree  is  admirable.** 

Whether  or  not  Cyrus  Chilcott  was  of  the  twice- 
born  caste,  the  writer  does  not  know.  His 
chosen  calling  would  indicate  that  he  was  earnest- 
minded,  unselfish,  self-sacrificing  and  devoted  to 
high  ideals.  Miss  Fielde  was  certainly  very  much 
impressed  with  him;  and,  though  they  were  never 
married,  she  was  faithful  to  her  nuptial  vows,  re- 
maining single.  While  in  Siam  she  was  known 
among  the  natives  as  "Teacheress  Chilcott,**  but 
whether  or  not  she  intentionally  abandoned  her  own 
name  and  assumed  his,  is  problematical.  When  at 
the  height  of  her  fame  and  popularity  as  an  author, 
she  had  several  offers  of  marriage,  each  of  which, 
from  a  worldly  viewpoint,  was  regarded  as  advan- 
tageous, but  which  she  declined. 

The  hours  of  the  long  summer  days  spent  at  the 
Chilcott  home  were  all  too  short  for  the  newly  en- 

Page  Sixty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

gaged  couple.  They  had  much  to  talk  about  and 
many  things  to  adjust  before  a  date  could  be  fixed 
for  their  marriage.  Love  had  little  difficulty  in  re- 
moving the  obstacles  that  their  differences  of  opin- 
ion respecting  religious  creed  and  doctrinal  belief 
might  have  presented  under  less  propitious  circum- 
stances. But  the  fundamental  principles  of  the 
Universalists  and  Baptist  teachings  were  so  nearly 
alike,  that  Miss  Fielde  readily  consented  to  leave 
the  church  of  her  choice  and  unite  with  his  so  that 
they  might  worship  God  together  under  the  same 
roof.  This  sacrifice,  however,  was  small  compared 
to  another  that  she  was  called  on  to  endure.  Her 
parents  were  getting  old.  They  were  now  alone 
except  for  the  presence  of  their  youngest  child, 
whose  contributions  to  their  support  were  needed 
by  them,  but  not  nearly  so  much  so  as  the  comforts 
of  her  love  and  cheerful  companionship.  Sense  of 
duty  was  the  strongest  guiding  principle  that  Miss 
Fielde  possessed;  and  not  even  love  could  tempt 
her  to  avoid  the  natural  obligations  she  felt  she 
owed  her  father  and  mother. 

It  required  an  all  night  session  to  fully  discuss 
this  phase  of  the  situation,  according  to  Miss  Chil- 
cott's  recently  related  account  of  the  courtship,  and 
the  return  of  another  day  found  the  problem  still 
unsolved.  The  agreement  that  was  finally  reached 

Page    Sixty-Two 


Engagement  to  Cyrus  Chilcott 

was  based  largely  upon  two  contingencies.  It  was 
understood  by  and  between  them  that  if  her  par- 
ents gave  their  consent,  and  she  could  secure  an 
engagement  as  a  paid  missionary  teacher,  so  that 
she  could  apply  a  portion  of  her  earnings  for  their 
benefit,  she  would  follow  her  affianced  husband  to 
the  Orient  within  a  year  and  become  his  wife,  other- 
wise she  would  remain  at  home. 

It  did  not  take  so  long  for  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Field  to 
settle  the  matter.  They  were  both  very  much  of 
the  same  heroic  material  of  which  their  daughter 
was  made.  Without  a  moment's  hesitation  they 
bade  her  go,  declaring  themselves  fully  capable  of 
providing  for  their  own  support  and  welfare;  at 
the  same  time,  it  is  not  improbable,  they  realized 
that  the  chances  of  again  meeting  their  child  on 
earth  was  very  small,  indeed. 

Cyrus  Chilcott  sailed  for  his  post  in  the  month 
of  August  and  arrived  at  Bangkok  Christmas  Eve 
of  the  same  year,  1 864.  The  files  of  the  Baptist 
Missionary  Magazine  contains  the  following  print- 
ed copy  of  a  letter  written  by  Mr.  Chilcott  soon 
after  his  arrival: 

"Bangkok,  January  4,  1865. 
"I  am  very  happy  to  announce  our  safe  arrival  in 
the  'Promised  Land*  and  that  we  find  it  a  better 
land  than  the  'spies*  sent  before  had  reported.     We 

Page   Sixty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

reached  our  destination  on  Christmas  Eve,  fourteen 
days  from  Hongkong,  all  well  and  in  good  spirits, 
and  devoutly  grateful  to  Him  whose  goodness  and 
mercy  have  followed  us  over  the  wide  waters  and 
whose  right  hand  is  upholding  us  in  these  uttermost 
parts  of  the  earth. 

"Dr.  Chandler  publishes  a  weekly  paper  called 
the  Siam  Times  and  besides  does  job  work  and 
some  Siamese  printing.  The  paper  has  just  entered 
the  seventh  month  of  its  existence. 

"We  find  the  remnants  of  the  old  Chinese  church 
here  but  exactly  in  what  condition  time  will  more 
fully  develop.  *  *  * 

"I  find  Dr.  Ashmore's  old  teacher  here  and  shall 
avail  myself  of  his  services.  *  *  * 

"I  like  the  looks  of  things  much  better  than  I  ex- 
pected." 

Miss  Fielde  had  little  difficulty  in  securing  a  com- 
mission as  a  missionary  teacher  to  Siam,  when  it 
was  shown  that  she  was  eminently  capable  of  dis- 
charging the  duties  pertaining  to  that  office,  and 
upon  the  further  explanation  that  she  was  going  out 
to  marry  Mr.  Chilcott.  As  a  preliminary  condition  to 
the  agreement,  it  was  stipulated  on  the  part  of  the 
Baptist  Board  of  Foreign  Missions  that  she  should 
become  a  member  of  the  Baptist  church  denomina- 
tion and  remain  at  her  post  of  duty  not  less  than 
five  years  from  the  date  of  her  entry  into  the  serv- 
ice. She  entered  into  the  prescribed  contract;  and 

Page   Sixty-Four 


Engagement  to  Cyrus  Chilcott 

in  January,  1865,  was  baptised  into  the  Calvary 
Baptist  Church,  of  Washington,  D.  C.,  by  the  Rev. 
T.  Reolyn  Howlett,  who  several  years  previously, 
had  been  pastor  of  a  Baptist  congregation  at  Al- 
bany, New  York. 

She  was  obliged  to  wait  nearly  a  year  before  she 
could  secure  passage  on  one  of  the  slow-going  sail- 
ing ships,  then  in  use  at  that  period,  but  finally  did 
so.  An  account  of  her  voyage,  written  by  herself, 
was  published  in  the  Spinning  Wheel  Magazine, 
July,  1915;  a  reproduction  of  which  forms  the  con- 
tents of  the  succeeding  chapter. 


Page   Sixty-Five 


CHAPTER  SIX 
A  Voyage  to  the  Orient;  Miss  Fielde's  Own  Story 

ON  THE  twentieth  day  of  December,  1865, 
the  good  ship,  N.  B.  Palmer,  fourteen  hun- 
dred tons,  sailed  from  New  York  for  Hong- 
kong, with  Captain  Joseph  Steele  in  command, 
seventeen  passengers,  an  adequate  white  crew,  and 
an  inoffensive  mixed  cargo.  There  were  then  no 
passenger  steamers  crossing  the  Pacific.  The  first 
liner  to  make  transit  across  the  greatest  ocean  was 
the  Colorado  whose  initial  trip  from  San  Francisco 
to  the  Orient  began  on  January  first,  1867.  The 
securest  route  to  China  was  therefore  thought  to  be 
by  one  of  the  noted  tea-clippers,  whose  captain 
would  receive  emoluments  from  the  owners  in  case 
he  should  make  the  earliest  return  with  tea  of  the 
latest  crop  grown  in  China. 

"The  N.  B.  Palmer,  belonging  to  A.  A.  Low  & 
Co.  of  New  York  was  of  proven  speed  and  sound- 
ness, and  her  captain  was  of  notable  standing  among 
his  peers.  Most  of  the  passengers,  of  whom  I  was 
one,  had  waited  for  months  upon  the  movements 
of  this  particular  ship,  whose  route  was  to  be 
around  the  southern  point  of  Africa,  without  stop- 
page at  any  port,  and  with  the  expectation  that  a 
hundred  days  would  suffice  for  her  transit  to  the 
other  side  of  the  world. 

"Two  mission  boards  had  placed  nine  persons 
among  its  passengers:  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Virgil  Hart, 

Page  Sixty-Six 


A  Voyage  to  the  Orient;  Miss  Fielde's  Own  Story 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Wheeler  with  their  two  tiny  girls, 
of  the  Methodist  body,  and  Mr.  and /Mrs.  Kreyer 
and  myself  of  the  American  Baptist  Union.  The 
other  passengers  were  General  Kiernan  and  wife 
going  to  Chin  Kiang,  where  he  would  be  Consul; 
Mr.  and  Miss  Sands  of  Brooklyn,  brother  and  sist- 
er of  Mrs.  Kiernan;  the  two  Wynn  brothers,  ex- 
pecting to  establish  themselves  as  dentists  in 
China;  Mrs.  Maynard  of  Boston,  an  invalid,  in- 
tending to  spend  a  year  with  her  married  daughter 
in  Hongkong;  and  Mr.  Rogers,  a  youthful  seek- 
er of  fortune.  For  most  of  these  passengers  it 
was  the  first  sea  voyage,  with  all  experiences  new 
and  strange. 

"Great  flakes  of  snow  fell  slowly  on  the  deck  as 
we  stood  watching  the  receding  shore  of  native 
land,  wondering  when  and  whether  it  would  ever 
again  be  of  our  beholding.  Hope  prevented  heart- 
break. Then  there  were  immediate  cares,  the  pro- 
vident bestowal  of  flowers,  fruits  and  confection- 
ery, last  tokens  of  the  interest  of  dear  friends 
who  had  just  wished  us  good  speed.  Miss  Sands, 
slightly  my  junior,  introduced  to  me  as  my  cabin- 
mate,  straightway  won  my  regard  by  proposing 
that  we  each  occupy  the  lower  of  the  two  berths 
a  week  at  a  time  alternately,  and  by  insisting  upon 
an  absolutely  just  allotment  of  the  brass  hooks 
that  must  serve  us  as  wardrobe.  The  initial 
indications  pointed  truly.  Never  was  there  cabin- 
mate  more  durably  companionable  than  was  Miss 
Sands. 

Page   Sixty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"A  cursory  survey  of  the  ship  made  us  acquaint- 
ed with  the  after  deck,  our  prospective  area  for 
open-air  exercise;  with  the  middle  deck,  which  we 
were  not  to  cross  save  with  the  captain's  permis- 
sion ;  and  with  the  forecastle,  the  dormitory  of  the 
sailors. 

"Below  the  after  deck  was  a  ladies'  cabin,  partly 
filled  by  a  grand  piano  and  a  semi-circular  divan 
following  the  contour  of  the  stern.  There  the 
smell  of  bilge-water  was  overpowering,  and  the 
movement  of  the  ship  very  impressive.  Captain 
Steele,  forceful,  merry  and  profane,  was  the  only 
person  on  board  who  could  long  preserve  equan- 
imity in  this  handsomely  appointed  saloon. 

*'In  front  of  it  was  a  dining-saloon,  with  a  long, 
narrow  table.  The  captain  and  the  first  mate 
sat  at  the  two  ends  and  the  passengers  had  fixed 
seats  at  the  sides.  There  were  four  private  cab- 
ins on  each  side  of  the  dining-saloon  and  Miss 
Sands  and  I  had  the  one  nearest  the  stern  on  the 
port  side. 

"Gradually  we  learned  the  vocabulary  of  the  sea, 
and  knew  the  names  of  all  the  sails  and  spars,  the 
location  of  the  scuppers,  and  the  uses  of  belaying 
pins,  bitts  and  binnacle.  We  soon  prided  ourselves 
on  fluency  and  accuracy  in  nautical  terminology. 
I  learned  to  take  the  sun  and  to  keep  the  ship's 
log. 

"Early  in  our  voyage,  Miss  Sands  suggested  that 
its  length  and  leisure  ought  to  conduce  to  our  high- 
er education.  That  very  day  we  elaborated  a  pro- 

Pa.se    Sixty-Eight 


A  Voyage  to  the  Orient;  Miss  Fielde's  Own  Story 

gramme  requiring  exercise  on  deck  for  an  hour  aft- 
er breakfast,  then  an  hour  in  the  study  of  French, 
and  an  hour  in  the  reading  of  history.  In  the  aft- 
ernoons we  were  to  sew,  and  were  to  take  turns 
in  playing  chess  with  the  invalid,  for  whom  chess 
was  the  sole  palliative  of  misery  in  a  sea- voyage. 
The  next  day  we  achieved  our  programme  per- 
fectly ;  but  during  the  ensuing  night  the  waves  rose 
high  and  for  many  consecutive  days  we  were  un- 
able to  leave  our  bunks.  Then,  in  early  dawn, 
Miss  Sands,  peering  through  our  single  port-hole 
over  the  upper  berth,  called  blithely,  Oh,  Miss 
Fielde,  the  sun  is  shining,  the  sea  is  calm.  To-day 
we  can  return  to  our  regular  habits!  And  so  did 
we;  but  hourly  changes  in  latitude  and  longitude 
bring  vicissitudes  that  greatly  interfere  with  regu- 
lar habits. 

*  There  was  frequent  call  to  the  after  deck  for  the 
inspection  of  strange  denizens  of  the  deep.  The 
propeller  of  a  steamer  frightens  these  creatures 
away;  but  our  sailing  vessel  was  to  them  only  an- 
other water  bird  disporting  itself  in  their  domain. 
Close  to  her  sides  came  schools  of  leviathans  and 
of  gay  jelly-fish.  We  seemed  to  meet  all  the  inhab- 
itants of  the  ocean,  except  the  sea-serpent.  Some- 
times a  shark,  a  porpoise,  or  a  turtle  was  captured 
and  examined  on  deck.  Once  a  passenger  caught, 
on  a  fish-hook,  a  stormy  petrel  and  kept  it  on  board 
until  the  sailors  demanded  its  release.  The  crew 
had  declared  from  the  beginning  of  the  voyage 
that  bad  luck  would  come  to  a  ship  carrying  so 

Pa*e   Sixty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

many  sky  pilots,  and  the  capture  of  the  stormy  pet- 
rel further  aroused  their  abiding  superstitions  and 
established  a  grouch  that  had  no  palliative. 

"There  was  little  communication  between  the  pas- 
sengers and  the  crew,  but  an  exception  was  made 
in  favor  of  the  old  quartermaster,  Joe,  during  his 
long  illness,  when  I  was  permitted  to  carry  to  his 
cabin  such  tidbits  as  I  might  secure,  after  dinner, 
from  the  captain's  table.  Another  exception  was 
made  for  young  Shaw,  a  Boston  lad  of  seventeen 
years,  whose  mother  had  sent  to  Captain  Steele 
a  touching  appeal,  begging  him  to  guard  the  morals 
of  her  boy,  whose  mind  was  set  upon  a  career  at 
sea.  Many  half-hours  did  I  sit  with  Shaw  upon  the 
carpenter's  bench  and  talk  of  a  better  life  than  that 
of  the  forecastle  where  boy  Shaw  was  being  disil- 
lusioned. Had  I  myself  been  rightly  educated,  I 
might  have  warned  him  against  contagion  from  the 
strange  sores  that  I  saw  on  many  of  the  sailors,  but 
I  was  as  ignorant  as  was  he  of  their  terrible  signi- 
ficance. 

"Mr.  Sands  edited  a  weekly  newspaper,  The  Hur- 
ricane, filled  by  anonymous  communications  from 
the  passengers  and  read  aloud  to  them  at  evening 
assemblages  in  the  dining  saloon.  The  entertain- 
ment was  sometimes  enlivened  by  singing.  Little 
Miss  Wheeler  was  often  called  upon  for  a  hymn, 
and  she  never  failed  to  respond  with  her  whole 
repertoire.  Standing  very  erect,  her  flaxen  hair 
floating,  her  hands  grasping  tightly  on  either  side 

Pxage    Seventy 


A  Voyage  to  the  Orient;  Miss  Fielde's  Own  Story 

her  short  gingham  skirt,  her  shrill  little  treble  rang 

out: 

I  want  to  be  an  angel 

And  with  the  angels  stand, 
A  town  upon  my  forehead, 

A  harper  in  my  hand. 

If  the  encore  was  loud  she  would  sing  it  again. 

"Finding  abundant  material  for  costumes  in  the 
bunting-chest,  to  which  the  captain  gave  us  access 
upon  our  promise  to  make  for  him,  during  the  voy- 
age, a  complete  set  of  new  signal-flags,  the  pas- 
sengers divided  themselves  into  two  groups,  each 
group  to  serve  in  turn  as  entertainers  and  as  audi- 
ence. Original  dramas,  charades,  and  tableaux 
were  presented.  They  were  staged  on  the  edge  of 
the  after  deck,  the  audience  being  judiciously  seat- 
ed close  by  on  the  middle  deck.  I  recall  one  eve- 
ning when  the  group  with  which  Miss  Sands  and  I 
were  affiliated  had  undertaken  an  elaborate  tableau 
entitled  Miriam  and  Her  Maidens.  We  meant 
to  represent  them  as  rejoicing  after  the  successful 
passage  of  the  Red  Sea,  when  the  Israelites  fled 
from  Egypt.  On  the  rocks,  simulated  by  gray  can- 
vas heaped  over  sea-chests,  stood  the  maidens  in 
bright  array,  with  Miriam  in  their  midst,  about  to 
clash  the  cymbals,  consisting  of  shining  kettle  cov- 
ers from  the  cook's  galley.  At  the  moment  of  with- 
drawal of  the  curtain,  and  the  recital  by  our  an- 
nouncer of  the  lines : 

"Sound  the  loud  timbrel  o'er  Egypt's  dark  sea; 
Jehovah  hath  triumphed.    His  people  are  free!" 

an  unexplained  wave  struck  the  ship  sending  Miri- 
am, maidens  and  rocks  into  one  heap  beside  the 

Page   Seventy-On* 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

deck  house.  The  audience  rescued  the  players, 
unbroken,  but  there  was  no  further  performance 
that  evening. 

"We  crossed  the  line  on  a  sunny  day,  and  Nep- 
tune, with  many  attendant  sea  gods,  came  on  board, 
over  the  stern.  The  gods  all  bore  a  striking  resem- 
blance to  Santa  Claus  as  he  appears  under  the  best 
household  traditions;  but  the  antics  they  played 
with  tridents,  hose  and  barrels  on  the  middle  deck 
where  an  artificial  tempest  was  created,  made  the 
passengers  very  appreciative  of  Captain  Steele's 
hint,  given  the  previous  evening,  to  the  effect  that 
the  day  of  crossing  the  equator  was  one  on  which 
one's  worst  clothes  should  be  worn. 

"We  were  constant  in  our  lookout  for  other  ships, 
whether  they  passed  by  day  or  in  moonlighted 
nights.  Leaning  against  the  bulwark,  we  discern- 
ed on  the  horizon  the  tops  of  masts.  Sometimes 
the  masts  seemed  to  rise  until  the  hull  came  into 
view,  and  the  signal  flags  entered  into  conversa- 
tion. The  name  of  the  ship,  the  last  port  of  call, 
the  destination,  the  recorded  latitude  and  longitude, 
the  sort  of  cargo,  the  number  of  passengers,  and  as 
many  other  facts  as  the  distance  or  the  light  would 
reveal,  were  made  known  by  each  ship  to  the  other 
as  it  sped  by.  The  signal  for  good-bye  was  al- 
ways raised  at  parting.  If  the  passing  vessel  flew 
old  glory  at  its  stern,  as  did  the  AT.  B.  Palmer,  we 
did  not  thereafter  look  at  one  another  for  a  while. 
It  is  not  polite  to  observe  furtive  tears. 

Page  Seventy-Two 


A  Voyage  to  the  Orient;  Miss  Fielde's  Own  Story 

"Of  land  we  saw  only  the  coast  of  Brazil  and  the 
islands  of  Tristan  da  Cunha  in  the  distance. 

"Then  the  tanks  rusted,  and  our  drinking  water 
became  scant,  so  that  the  captain  decided  to  go  into 
Cape  Town  for  fresh  supplies.  At  Cape  Town,  I 
ate  green  figs  for  the  first  time,  picking  them  from 
the  tree.  I  saw  an  antelope  no  bigger  than  a  fox 
terrier;  went,  under  guidance,  to  visit  a  real  Bush- 
man, nested  in  tall  grass  in  the  wilds;  heard  thrill- 
ing stories  from  missionaries,  experienced  in  native 
behavior;  and  I  am  tenacious  of  an  impression  that 
I  inspected  a  stuffed  specimen  of  the  long  extinct 
dodo  in  the  local  museum.  During  the  five  days 
that  our  ship  remained  at  Cape  Town,  its  passen- 
gers were  entertained  in  the  homes  of  resident 
Americans,  and  we  thus  escaped  the  dangers  of  a 
mutiny  quelled  with  bloodshed,  on  its  decks.  The 
removal  of  the  second  mate  and  the  restoration 
of  order  preceded  the  continuance  of  our  voyage. 

"In  the  Indian  Ocean  we  encountered  a  typhoon, 
that  mauled  and  drove  our  ship  for  days,  spent  in 
bunks  by  the  prostrated  passengers,  and  in  terrific 
exertion  by  the  crew.  Upon  its  abatement  we  re- 
turned to  our  charted  course  and  in  a  shining  calm 
lingered  near  enchanting  coral  beds.  These  tempt- 
ed some  of  our  men  to  go  off  in  small  boats  for  the 
gathering  of  multicolored  sprays,  which  were 
brought  on  board  and  were  cherished  on  the  roof 
of  the  deck-house  until  their  unbearable  stench 
compelled  their  return  to  the  ocean. 

Page   Seventy-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"By  the  time  we  approached  Anjer,  a  town  then 
at  the  west  end  of  Java,  the  condition  of  our  water 
tanks  necessitated  our  entrance  to  its  harbor.  The 
passengers  had  experience  of  a  sweltering  night  at 
a  hotel  on  shore,  and  of  some  delightful  daylight 
hours  in  a  wonderful  tropical  garden.  The  old 
Anjer  is  no  longer  extant.  In  1 883  it  was  cast  to 
the  bottom  of  the  sea  by  a  volcanic  earthquake. 
The  newer  town  has  a  site  further  inland. 

"As  our  ship  passed  slowly  through  the  straits 
between  Java  and  Sumatra,  strong  perfumes  from 
jungle  flowers  were  wafted  to  us  on  the  night 
breezes.  A  strange  insomnia  followed  the  inhala- 
tion of  these  scents,  and  then  jungle  fever  seized  all 
on  board  save  the  captain  and  the  colored  steward 
and  stewardess.  There  were  degrees  in  the  sever- 
ity of  the  fever  and  some  of  its  victims  were  scarce- 
ly disabled  while  others  were  scarcely  alive.  A  chill 
like  that  of  ice  in  the  veins  was  followed  by  scorch- 
ing fever,  accompanied  by  unusual  strength  and 
wild  delirium,  succeeded  by  collapse,  utter  help- 
lessness and  possible  coma.  While  in  a  state  of 
coma,  I  was  thought  to  have  died.  The  distress  of 
resuscitation  remains  in  my  memory. 

"There  was  no  doctor  on  board,  and  no  quinine  in 
the  ship's  medicine  chest.  Sailors,  mad  with  fever, 
were  locked  in  the  cabins  to  prevent  them  jumping 
overboard.  The  water  tanks  were  rusty  and  the 
water  foul.  One  night  there  was  a  slight  shower, 
and  the  first  mate,  by  setting  pans  on  the  deck, 
caught  half  a  teacupful  of  rain  water  which  he 

Page    Seventy-Four 


A  Voyage  to  the  Orient;  Miss  Fielde's  Own  Story 

brought  to  me.  I  know  how  nectar  tasted  to  the 
gods  on  Olympus. 

"We  were  three  weeks  in  traversing  the  China 
Sea.  As  Victoria  Peak  came  into  view  the  second 
mate,  an  old  whaler,  in  the  delirium  of  fever,  jump- 
ed overboard  and  was  rescued  after  long  pursuit 
in  the  rowboats,  only  to  die  the  same  day. 

"On  a  clear  morning  in  May  we  entered  the  har- 
bor of  Hongkong.  Ten  of  the  crew  were  carried 
ashore  for  burial.  All  the  passengers  survived.  We 
were  a  hundred  and  forty-nine  days  from  New 
York,  had  been  given  up  for  lost,  and  the  ship's  in- 
surance had  been  claimed.  No  word  from  our 
known  world  had  come  to  any  of  us  in  five  months. 

"I  was  barely  able  to  stand,  and  Miss  Sands,  who 
had  partially  recovered,  arrayed  me  in  white.  The 
passengers  hastened  ashore,  and  scattered  over 
Asia.  I  never  knew  what  became  of  old  Joe  or  of 
young  Shaw.  Years  later  Captain  Steele  died  in 
China,  and  Mr.  Sands  and  General  Kiernan  died  in 
America.  Mr.  Hart  became  a  bishop  of  his  church 
in  North  China.  The  little  Wheeler  girl  returned 
to  America  for  her  education  and  then  rejoined  her 
parents  in  their  mission  field.  I  have  been  told  that 
the  old  ship  became  an  oil  carrier  and  was  eventual- 
ly burned. 

"Forty-seven  years  after  our  parting  on  the  N.  B. 
Palmer,  my  cabin-mate  and  I  again  met.  One  of 
us  had  retained  the  old  name  and  its  appearance  in 
a  newspaper  brought  us  into  communication.  We 
were  but  thirty  miles  apart,  on  the  Pacific  coast, 

Page   Seventy-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

and  we  set  an  early  day  for  our  reunion  in  Seattle. 
"She  had  soon  returned  to  America,  and  had  lived 
a  carefully  protected  life,  with  sturdy  offspring,  in 
an  opulent  home  of  the  middle  West.  I  had  been 
tossed  between  soft  pillows  and  hard  posts,  on  three 
continents.  At  the  end  of  a  day  together  we  each 
said  to  the  other,  'I  should  never  have  recognized 
your  face,  carven  with  the  records  of  five  decades. 
But  you  are  essentially  the  same.  Character  is  the 
one  unchanging  thing  in  the  world/ 


Page  Seyenty-Six 


CHAPTER  SEVEN 
Death  of  Cyrus  Chilcott;  111  at  Hongkong 

CHAPTER  Six  left  Miss  Fielde  aboard  the 
N.  B.  Palmer,  ill  in  her  cabin  and  dressed  in 
white.  In  her  narrative  os  "A  Sea  Voyage  of 
Fifty  Years  Ago,"  Miss  Fielde  did  not  disclose  the 
significance  of  her  unusual  costume,  or  refer  to 
the  intensely  dramatic  incidents  that  immediately 
followed  the  berthing  of  the  ship.  These  latter, 
mere  personal  details,  were  left  to  the  efforts  of  her 
biographer,  who  has  gathered  them  from  miscellane- 
ous though  concordant  sources  of  information,  and 
is  therefore  able  to  present  them  in  a  meagre,  though 
fairly  reliable  form. 

Soon  after  Miss  Fielde's  death,  which  event  oc- 
curred February  23rd,  1916,  the  writer  hereof 
visited  Mrs.  Edward  L.  Marsh,  of  Tacoma,  Wash- 
ington, the  Miss  Sands  of  1 865.  Mrs.  Marsh  took 
up  the  thread  of  the  story  where  Miss  Fielde  had 
left  off.  She  explained  that  Miss  Fielde  and  Mr. 
Chilcott  had  arranged  to  meet  at  Hongkong  and  to 
be  married  aboard  the  ship.  At  that  time  Mrs. 
Marsh  had  all  the  romantic  ideas  of  courtship  and 
marriage  common  to  an  eighteen-year-old  girl  of 
that  somewhat  perfervid  period.  She  felt  that  the 
sacrilegious  eyes  of  no  third  person  should  be  per- 

Page   Seventy-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

mitted  to  witness  the  initial  meeting  of  the  reunited 
lovers.  Consequently,  with  the  other  passengers 
who  still  remained  aboard,  she  withdrew  to  the  up- 
per deck,  leaving  Miss  Fielde  alone  in  the  cabin. 

After  several  hours  of  waiting,  a  small  boat  row- 
ed by  two  missionaries  left  the  shore  and  proceed- 
ed towards  the  ship.  Neither  of  the  rowers  answer- 
ed the  description  of  Mr.  Chilcott,  however,  and  a 
feeling  of  impending  calamity  possessed  those  who 
watched  the  approaching  craft.  The  looked-for, 
longed-for  lover  failed  to  come.  The  missionaries 
were  delegates,  appointed  to  meet  Miss  Fielde  and 
notify  her  of  Mr.  Chilcott's  death,  which  occurred 
at  Bangkok,  the  30th  of  December  preceding,  ten 
days  after  she  had  sailed  from  America. 

Consternation  seized  upon  each  of  the  little 
group  when  a  conference  was  called  for  the  purpose 
of  selecting  some  one  of  them  to  break  the  news 
to  the  frail  woman  in  her  cabin  below.  No  one  vol- 
unteered, and  each  pleaded  every  available  excuse 
for  declining  the  mission.  Captain  Steele  suggest- 
ed that  Miss  Sands,  being  more  intimate  with  Miss 
Fielde  than  any  of  the  others,  was  the  better  fitted 
to  perform  that  duty.  Miss  Sands  conscientiously 
tried  to  summon  the  needed  courage  but  failed  in 
her  efforts.  Each  of  the  passengers  was  examined 
in  turn  but  none  of  them  proved  equal  to  the  under- 

Page  Seventj'-Eight 


Death  of  Cyrus  Chilcott 

taking.  Finally  Dr.  Legge,  a  resident  physician  of 
Hongkong,  who  had  just  come  aboard,  went  alone 
to  Miss  Fielde  and  performed  the  painful  task. 

Miss  Fielde  received  the  heartbreaking  news 
with  apparent  calm.  She  called  her  friends  about 
her  and  sought  their  advice  as  to  how  she  should 
meet  the  situation.  Captain  Steele  proposed  taking 
her  back  to  New  York  on  the  return  voyage  of  the 
ship,  which  was  to  begin  within  a  few  days.  The 
passengers  seconded  his  efforts  to  pursuade  her 
that  that  was  the  safest  and  only  proper  course  to 
pursue.  But  Miss  Fielde  could  not  make  up  her 
mind  readily.  She  thanked  them  for  their  genuine 
interest  in  her  welfare,  especially  the  kind  hearted 
skipper,  begging  for  further  time  to  think  over  the 
matter  before  deciding.  At  the  end  of  an  hour  she 
determined  to  go  on  to  the  end  of  her  journey,  and 
so  informed  her  friends.  She  explained  her  decis- 
ion by  stating  that  she  felt  she  could  never  be 
satisfied  if  she  failed  to,  at  least,  see  the  place  which 
her  dreams  had  so  long  pictured  as  the  scene  of 
her  greatest  happiness  and  contentment.  Then  the 
tension  snapped  and  unconscious  she  was  bourne 
ashore  and  taken  to  a  sanitorium,  where  she  lay 
three  weeks  dangerously  ill.  Here  kind  friends 
nursed  her  continuously,  some  of  them  having  to 
delay  their  own  journey  to  attend  to  her  comfort. 

Page  Seventy-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

To  Miss  Fielde  the  death  of  Cyrus  Chilcott  was 
the  greatest  misfortune  that  could  have  possibly 
occurred.  She  was  disappointed  beyond  measure. 
She  was  naturally  domestic,  and  it  was  simply  out 
of  the  question  for  her  to  conceive  of  a  successful 
life  for  herself  that  was  not  based  upon  conjugal 
love,  the  care  of  a  home  and  the  rearing  of  child- 
ren. 

Mr.  Chilcott's  death  ended  all  thought  of  mar- 
riage and  children,  though  it  wrought  no  radical 
change  in  Miss  Fielde's  disposition.  True,  she  was 
a  person  of  intense  affection,  but  her  capacity  to 
love  was  not  limited  to  a  single  individual  or  a 
group  of  individuals.  It  was  world-wide  and  no 
human  being  was  outside  the  pale  of  its  influence 
or  beyond  the  scope  of  its  activities.  While  Miss 
Fielde's  disappointment  was  none-the-less  keen,  it 
was  followed  by  no  world  bitterness  or  misanthrop- 
ic sorrow.  The  general  effect  of  her  tragic  experi- 
ence was  well  described  in  her  own  words:  "I  then 
resolved  to  live  less  myself  that  others  might  live 
more  through  me." 

The  writer  will  never  forget  the  solemnity 
of  one  summer  evening,  when  seated  in  Miss 
Fielde's  home  in  Seattle,  listening  to  a  recital  of  the 
tragedy  a  half  century  after  its  occurrence.  Miss 
Fielde  idealized  the  missionary  lover's  character 

Page  Eighty 


CYRUS    CHILCOTT,    MISSIONARY    TO    THE    CHINESE    AT 
BANGKOK,    SIAM 


Death  of  Cyrus  Chilcott 

to  the  extent  that  she  considered  it  flawless.  Her 
memory  of  him  was  as  fresh  and  her  constancy  as 
alert  as  the  day  he  left  her  for  the  land  of  heathen- 
dom, to  search  for  and  find  his  holy  grail.  In  Miss 
Fielde's  maiden  heart,  which  was  large  enough  to 
contain  the  universe,  her  dead  lover  represented 
perfection  and  the  memorj'  of  his  lustrous  qualities 
was  undimmed,  untarnished  by  the  long  vista  of 
the  years  that  had  passed. 

Coming  out  from  her  presence  that  night  was 
an  experience  akin  to  leaving  the  Holy  of  Holies. 
On  reaching  the  city's  streets  an  unbidden,  discord- 
ant thought  persisted  in  intruding  itself.  While 
reverencing  the  woman's  fidelity  to  an  ideal,  one 
could  not  help  but  question  if  a  real  marriage  with 
Mr.  Chilcott  would  have  proven  as  beautifully  per- 
fect as  the  one  contained  in  the  imagery  of  her 
dream.  Would  the  search  for  truth  in  after  years, 
by  each  in  his  own  way,  have  served  to  strengthen 
or  weaken  their  union?  Would  she  not,  in  reach- 
ing the  heights  to  which  she  finally  attained  in  mod- 
ern thought,  have  left  him  behind,  dissatisfied  and 
uncomprehending  ? 

There  is  nothing  in  the  foregoing  that  is  intended 
to  belittle  the  character  or  mental  capacity  of  Cyrus 
Chilcott.  He  was  certainly  an  exceptional  man, 
earnest  of  purpose,  devoted  to  duty,  brave  and  self- 

Page    Eighty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

sacrificing.  A  letter  describing  his  death,  written 
by  Rev.  William  Dean,  D.  D.,  head  of  the  mission- 
ary workers  in  Siam,  and  published  in  the  Baptist 
Missionary  Magazine  in  1  866,  contains  suggestions 
on  which  a  good  estimate  of  the  man  may  be 
formed.  Following  is  Dr.  Dean  s  letter: 

"Bangkok,  Siam,  January  1 ,  1 866. 

"I  begin  this  letter  with  a  mournful  record. 
Brother  Chilcott,  my  beloved  colleague,  is  in  his 
grave.  After  an  illness  of  three  weeks  he  died  of 
typhoid  fever  on  Saturday,  December  30th.  Yes- 
terday, at  the  setting  of  the  sun,  we  laid  his  body 
away. 

"On  Friday  morning,  the  day  before  he  died,  he 
gave  us  his  parting  address,  stating  the  motive 
which  led  him  to  Bangkok ;  that  he  had  been  happy 
in  his  work  and  hopeful  of  his  labors;  that  with 
the  near  prospect  of  death,  he  had  no  regrets  that 
he  came  here;  while  he  would  have  been  glad  to 
live  and  assist  in  turning  the  poor  heathen  to  Christ, 
yet  he  was  quite  ready  to  go  at  the  Master's  call. 
He  said :  'Tell  my  friends  that  I  die  happy ;  not  with 
the  ecstasy  that  attends  some  death-bed'  scenes, 
but  my  heart  is  full  of  heavenly  peace/  After  a 
pause  he  took  a  smiling  farewell  of  the  members  of 
my  family  and  bade  the  boys,  Willie  and  Freddie, 
to  come  to  see  him  in  this  new  home  in  the  happy 
land.  His  whole  address  was  marked  with  clear- 
ness of  thought  and  expressed  in  chosen  language 
with  a  pathos  that  made  it  appear  like  an  inspira- 

Page  Eighty-Two 


Death  of  Cyrus  Chilcott 

tion  from  the  Holy  One.  After  this  he  failed  fast 
and  at  noon  on  Saturday  he  passed  into  a  quiet 
state  and  slept  in  Jesus  at  2  p.  m. 

"He  developed  into  a  man  of  great  promise — a 
man  of  sound  judgment  and  wise  counsel,  cheer- 
ful piety  and  Christian  faith.  The  attendance  at 
his  funeral  by  the  foreign  consuls  and  entire  foreign 
community  showed  how  highly  he  was  appreciated 
here.  I  am  bereft.  Can  you  send  us  another  man 
as  good  to  help  us  in  our  work?  While  he  lived  I 
rested  with  great  satisfaction  on  his  full  sympathy 
and  hearty  co-operation." 


Page    Eighty-Three 


CHAPTER  EIGHT 
Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

AN  account  of  Miss  Fielde's  journey  to  Bang- 
kok from  Hongkong,  her  experience  and  la- 
bors during  her  five  years'  residence  in  Siam, 
must  be  made  from  very  meagre  details.  She  sel- 
dom mentioned  her  life  there,  and  then  only  inci- 
dentally. The  statements  contained  in  this  chapter 
are  largely  excerpts  from  her  private  letters,  pub- 
lished writings  and  reports  made  to  the  Baptist 
Board  of  Foreign  Missions  in  America. 

Miss  Fielde  was  naturally  reserved.  She  usually 
refrained  from  entertaining  or  discussing  anything 
of  an  emotional  character  and  always  avoided  sub- 
jects that  were  disagreeable  or  painful  or  those  be- 
longing to  the  past.  It  is  unlikely  that  her  life  in 
Siam  was  reminiscent  of  many  pleasant  memories. 
She  went  there  under  circumstances  far  from  cheer- 
ful. Her  heart  was  desolate  with  sorrow  and  her 
strength  broken  by  physical  illness.  There  she  was 
obliged  to  readjust  the  entire  plan  of  her  life  at  the 
same  time  perform  the  monotonous  work  pertain- 
ing to  her  missionary  duties. 

A  letter  from  Dr.  Dean  admirably  describes  Miss 
Fielde's  first  appearance  at  the  Teloogoo  Mission , 
then  under  his  charge,  which  is  here  reproduced: 

Page  Eighty-Four 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

"Bangkok,  July  27th,   1866. 

"Miss  Fielde  reached  here  on  the  22nd,  after  a 
voyage  of  thirty-four  days  from  Hongkong  and 
seven  months  from  New  York.  She  seems  wonder- 
fully sustained  under  her  overwhelming  bereave- 
ment and  affords  by  her  personal  cheerfulness,  in 
this  hour  of  dire  calamity,  another  proof  of  the 
divinity  of  the  religion  she  has  come  to  teach.  She 
takes  the  house  fitted  up  for  her  reception  by  Mr. 
Chilcott,  her  husband,  during  the  last  weeks  of  his 
glowing  life.  Her  first  introduction  into  the  room 
where  he  died,  and  to  the  house  as  it  was  in  his 
health,  seemed  too  much  for  her  to  endure  and  live ; 
but  after  a  few  hours,  the  objects  most  familiar  to 
him  in  health,  and  the  room  that  witnessed  his  dying 
struggle,  seemed  to  speak  to  her,  not  only  in  solemn 
but  also  in  soothing  language,  while  her  counte- 
nance was  radiant  with  heavenly  light,  after  arising 
from  the  flood  of  deep  waters  through  which  she 
has  passed.  She  finds  a  warm  companionship  and 
welcome  in  my  family. 

"We  went  with  her  yesterday  to  Mr.  Chilcott's 
grave.  At  first  sight  she  fainted  but  soon  recov- 
ered, and  after  spending  a  little  time  at  the  sacred 
resting  place  of  her  chosen  husband,  she  came  away 
with  great  calmness  and  gave  directions  for  a  mon- 
ument to  be  erected  over  his  grave. 

"On  the  Sabbath  morning  she  attended  with  us 
the  Chinese  services  at  Wat  Kob  and  in  the  after- 
noon, at  the  Mission  House,  where  the  Chinese 
church  members  had  an  introduction  to  her.  After 

Page   Eighty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

listening  to  an  account  of  her  voyage  from  the 
United  States,  the  friends  and  home  she  had  left 
there,  and  her  mingled  emotions  in  coming  among 
them,  they  responded  by  brief  and  appropriate  re- 
marks, and  united  their  prayers  in  her  behalf.  They 
all  expressed  much  sympathy  in  her  sorrow  and  in- 
terest in  her  welfare." 

No  better  idea  of  Miss  Fielde's  feelings,  impres- 
sions and  early  experiences  could  be  given  than 
that  expressed  in  one  of  her  letters,  published  in  the 
Baptist  Missionary  Magazine  and  herein  copied: 

"Bangkok,  July  20th,  1866. 

"I  have  journeyed  seven  weary  months  over 
tempestuous  seas  and  in  strange  lands  to  meet  my 
beloved  and  I  have  found  his  grave  with  the  grass 
upon  it  seven  months  old.  I  have  come  to  my 
house;  it  is  left  unto  me  desolate.  While  I  stood 
holding  out  my  hand  for  a  cup  of  happiness,  one  of 
fearful  bitterness  was  pressed  violently  to  my  lips. 
I  looked  joyfully  towards  Providence  and  it  turned 
upon  me  a  face  of  inexpressible  darkness.  And  be- 
cause I  believe  in  God  I  have  been  able  to  endure  it. 

"At  Dr.  Dean's  I  have  received  such  welcome  as 
would  be  given  a  beloved  and  long  absent  daughter 
and  sister.  While  their  loving  kindness  gives  me 
home  and  friends,  they  have  with  delicate  consid- 
eration kept  the  house  which  my  husband  had  pre- 
pared for  my  reception  just  as  he  left  it.  I  occupy 
it  and  am  far  less  unhappy  than  I  should  be  else- 
where. It  is  so  permeated  by  the  atmosphere  of 

Page   Eighty-Six 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

his  holy  life  and  triumphant  death  that  everything 
I  see  or  touch  reminds  me,  not  so  much  of  the  joy 
I  have  lost,  as  the  bliss  which  he  has  attained.  In 
it  the  *  things  unseen*  become  as  real  to  me  as  the 
things  visible.  Here  are  his  cast  off  garments;  he 
has  put  on  robes  of  glory.  Here  are  the  lamps  by 
which  he  studied;  he  has  now  the  light  of  the 
Throne.  Here  is  his  cup ;  he  drinks  now  at  the  foun- 
tain of  'living  waters.'  Here  are  the  trees  which  he 
planted;  he  now  walks  under  those  'whose  leaves 
are  for  the  healing  of  the  nations/  Through  all 
these  mementoes  of  himself  he  says  to  me,  'If  ye 
loved  me  ye  would  rejoice  because  I  go  to  the 
Father/ 

"Several  of  the  Chinese  members  of  the  church 
have  been  to  see  me  and  Sunday  I  saw  them  all  to- 
gether. They  feel  their  loss  deeply.  There  is  no 
doubt  that  I  have  something  to  do  here/' 

At  the  time  of  Miss  Fielde's  residence  in  Siam, 
the  capital  city,  Bangkok,  was  a  place  of  three  hun- 
dred thousand  inhabitants.  It  comprised  then,  as 
now,  the  town  proper,  the  floating  town  consisting 
of  rafts  of  bamboo  lying  in  the  river  Menan,  and 
the  citadel,  the  residence  of  the  sovereign  and  his 
court,  situated  on  an  island  and  composed  of  pal- 
aces, temples,  gardens  and  many  beautiful  and  im- 
posing structures  of  Oriental  art. 

The  five  years  of  her  life  in  Siam  seems  to  have 
been  largely  spent  in  readjusting  herself  to  the 

Page   Eighty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

changes  of  environment  and  preparing  herself  for 
future  usefulness.  True,  she  performed  the  tasks  as- 
signed to  her  with  her  customary  fidelity  and  thor- 
oughness but  at  no  time  did  she  display  the  brilliant 
initiative  that  afterwards  marked  her  course  at  Swa- 
tow.  Much  of  her  time  was  devoted  to  the  study 
of  the  Chinese  language  and  learning  the  peculi- 
arities of  the  native  character,  which  afterwards 
proved  so  valuable  in  writing  her  stories  of  Chinese 
life.  In  a  letter  written  about  three  months  after 
her  arrival  at  Bangkok,  she  says: 

"I  rejoice  in  the  hope  of  sometime  being  able 
to  help  these  heathen.  When  my  tongue  is  loos- 
ened I  will  praise  God  in  Chinese. 

"I  am  content  in  my  surroundings  and  thankful 
for  the  friends  I  have  found.  Everyone  since  I 
landed  in  this  strange  Eastern  world  has  brought 
out  the  richest  stores  of  kindness  to  enwrap  me. 
Perhaps  it  is  worth  while  to  suffer  that  we  may 
learn  the  depths  of  goodness  in  our  fellow  beings 
and  the  wonderful  love  of  God.  Joy  has  gone 
from  my  house  with  my  friend;  but  the  faith  with 
which  he  triumphed  over  death  lives  with  me.  In 
my  desolation  I  feel  myself  held  close  to  the  heart 
of  God  and  am  happy." 

A  large  part  of  the  early  missionary  work  was 
in  alleviating  the  physical  ailments  of  the  natives 
to  whom  the  missionaries  ministered,  and  in  this 
endeavor  Miss  Fielde  was  singularly  efficient,  prin- 

Page  Eighty-Eight 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

cipally  by  teaching  them  the  way  to  be  clean  and 
the  evils  of  dirt  and  foul  air.  It  took  optimism, 
though,  to  report,  as  she  did,  of  her  field  and  its 
fruits  in  a  letter  to  the  Baptist  Union.  Under  date 
of  November  30th,  1866,  she  writes: 

"One  of  the  Chinese  Christians  has  been  ill  and 
will  probably  stay  with  us  but  a  little  longer.  He 
is  one  of  the  most  humble  and  simple  of  souls.  To 
such,  especially,  what  a  surprise  and  joy  the  New 
Jerusalem  will  be! 

"Among  the  missionary  fields  that  I  visited  in 
China,  I  saw  none  more  interesting  and  encourag- 
ing than  our  own.  In  Siam  the  character  and  cir- 
cumstances of  the  Chinese  render  our  work  more 
healthful  than  it  may  appear  to  some.  The  ma- 
terial may  be  hard,  but  is  durable.  Even  in  the 

midst  of  sickness,  peace  and  cheerfulness  abide  with 

>» 
us. 

When  the  squalid  life  by  which  she  was  sur- 
rounded became  too  oppressive,  Miss  Fielde  took 
refuge  in  her  tropical  garden.  Describing  a  trans- 
planted rose  in  June,  1867,  she  says: 

"I  have  just  been  transplanting  a  rose  bush  and 
learning  a  lesson.  The  plant  was  a  strong  one  with 
some  new  branches  starting  out  and  with  a  few 
buds  and  flowers.  I  knew  that  these  must  be  cut 
off,  if  I  would  have  the  plant  thrive  in  new  soil ;  but 
while  I  cut  them  the  plant  cried  out  to  me:  'Oh, 
why  destroy  these  bright  blossoms,  my  pride  and 

Page  Eighty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

glory,  that  which  I  delight  in  possessing  and  others 
delight  in  beholding?  Why  ruin  these  beautiful 
buds,  that  I  have  been  so  many  long  days  and  dark 
nights  in  preparing,  and  which  are  just  now  ap- 
proaching perfection  ?  Why  leave  me  maimed  and 
wounded  in  a  strange  place?'  And  I  answered: 
'Oh,  my  beloved,  I  do  this  that  you  may  live  and 
grow  fairer  and  much  more  luxuriant  than  before.' 
Just  so  we  human  creatures  cry  out  under  God's 
pruning  hand,  when  our  hopes  are  cut  off.  And, 
if  we  listen,  we  may  hear  Him  answer  us:  'Oh, 

my  beloved,   I  do  this  only  that  your  soul  may 

i*      »  *» 

live. 

In  regard  to  conditions  existing  in  Siam  during 
Miss  Fielde's  residence  in  that  country,  Dr.  Dean 
writes  to  the  Missionary  Board: 

"Bangkok,  May,  1867. 

"This  year  completes  the  three  years  of  my  en- 
listment, which  was  to  be  to  the  end  of  the  war  as 
God  should  decide.  We  need  a  reinforcement.  I 
should  have  two  young  men  associated  with  me  in 
this  mission,  while  you  have  left  me  only  two 
young  women.  My  present  colleagues  go  together 
to  some  of  the  out  stations  and  do  good  service. 
Still  in  this  heathen  country  of  pirates  and  pesti- 
lence, of  robbers  and  rapine,  it  is  more  than  we 
ought  to  ask  of  young  ladies,  accustomed  to  the 
protections  and  refinements  of  civilized  life,  to 
travel  in  buffalo  carts  over  the  land,  or  in  native 
boats  to  traverse  the  jungled  rivers  and  stormy 
gulfs.  For  this  outdoor  work  we  need  men." 

Pagce   Ninety 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

A  letter  written  by  Miss  Fielde  to  Miss  Sands 
affords  a  very  comprehensive  idea  of  the  social  con- 
ditions of  Bangkok  in  the  late  sixties.  Miss  Sands, 
it  will  be  remembered,  was  a  sister-in-law  of  Gen- 
eral Kiernan,  American  consul  to  Chin  Kiang,  and 
Miss  Fielde's  cabin  mate  on  the  "N.  B.  Palmer.'' 
At  the  time  Miss  Fielde  wrote,  Miss  Sands  was  liv- 
ing at  Chin  Kiang.  Miss  Fielde's  letter  follows : 

"Bangkok,  October   19th,   1868. 
"My  Very  Dear  Friend: 

"I  feel  excessively  like  talking  to  you  this  even- 
ing; as  that  is  impossible  I  do  the  next  best  thing, 
write  in  answer  to  your  dear  little  letter  of  August 
2nd,  received  ten  days  ago.  You  paint  well.  The 
picture  of  your  wee  house  and  garden  is  so  vivid 
that  I  think  from  it  I  shall  recognize  the  reality 
when  I  come  to  Chin  Kiang.  When,  echo  an- 
swers or  continues  to  ask,  when?  I  should  like  to 
come  more  than  I  can  tell  you,  but  you  know  we 
missionaries  never  take  journeys  except  for  our 
health  and  mine  is  dreadfully  good.  We  do  some- 
times make  long  tours  to  visit  more  remote  heath- 
en, but,  even  with  our  mutual  happiness  involved, 
I  can't  conscientiously  put  you  on  that  list. 

"Since  I  last  wrote  you  I  have  been  very  steadily 
in  Bangkok — have  only  been  away  once,  down  the 
coast  to  see  the  total  eclipse  of  the  sun  on  August 
1 8th.  The  site,  a  day's  journey  from  here  by 
steamer,  on  the  east  coast  of  the  Malayan  Penin- 
sula, was  the  place  where  the  obscuration  was 

Page   Ninety-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

longest  and  which  was  selected  by  French  astron- 
omers some  months  beforehand. 

"The  king  and  many  nobles  with  their  attend- 
ants took  up  their  abode  there  for  a  half  month  and 
entertained  with  royal  munificence.  A  large  party 
of  Europeans  from  Bangkok,  the  Governor  of 
Singapore  and  his  suite  came  also.  I  think  about 
twenty  nations  were  represented.  We  lived  in  leaf 
houses  that  were  built  in  a  day  and  were  the  cli- 
maxes of  rusticity.  It  was  a  most  curious  scene; 
the  long,  low,  sandy  beach,  backed  by  a  stretch 
of  jungle,  lying  against  a  line  of  irregular,  sharp 
topped  hills,  and  this  mushroom  village,  sprung 
up  just  out  of  the  reach  of  the  surf,  inhabited  by 
people  from  a  score  of  nations  from  the  most  en- 
lightened to  the  least  civilized,  all  assembled  to  wit- 
ness a  verification  of  what  Western  science  had 
foretold  of  what  would  take  place  at  a  certain  time, 
at  a  certain  spot  in  the  Eastern  world." 

"The  eclipse  came  on  at  half  past  ten  o'clock 
and  the  light  gradually  diminished  until  only  the 
faintest  line  of  the  sun's  disc  was  visible.  The 
earth  looked  as  it  does  under  brilliant  moonlight 
and  the  stars  shone  out.  When  the  sun's  face  was 
wholly  covered  the  change  in  the  appearance  of 
the  earth,  as  well  as  that  of  the  heavens  was  won- 
derful. The  hills,  the  sea,  the  jungle  and  beach, 
which  before  had  presented  a  tame  scene,  in  the 
stronger  light  or  lack  of  light,  became  awfully 
grand.  It  was  unlike  day  or  night  or  twilight.  I 
think  the  nearest  approach  to  its  semblance  is  in 

Page  Ninety-Two 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

the  heavy,  still  darkness  that  immediately  precedes 
a  typhoon.  The  eclipse  was  total  for  nearly  seven 
minutes.  The  thermometer  fell  three  degrees.  The 
bats  came  out  of  the  jungle  and  flew  about  and 
night-birds  sounded  their  weird  notes.  There  was 
an  universal,  involuntary  sigh,  such  as  one  gives 
when  recovering  from  a  swoon,  when  the  sun  ap- 
peared again.  Do  not  think  I  exaggerate.  It  was 
far  beyond  any  description.  This  is  one  of  the 
things  that  one  can  never  imagine.  He  must  see 
it  to  appreciate  it. 

"Bangkok  has  been  very  quiet  of  late.  The  king 
was  ill  for  several  weeks  of  fever,  taken  at  Hua 
Wan  (place  of  viewing  the  eclipse)  and  died  on  the 
2nd  of  this  month.  He  is  succeeded  by  his  son,  a 
lad  of  fifteen.  The  late  king  was  in  intelligence 
and  education  first  among  the  Asiatic  monarchs. 
He  was  very  liberal  in  his  policy  towards  foreign- 
ers and  much  esteemed  by  all  of  us.  He  leaves 
two  hundred  and  fifty  widows  and  seventy  small 
children.  The  Senabodi  was  assembled  when  the 
king  died,  and  so  quickly  were  its  decisions  made, 
that  the  notice  of  the  new  election  arrived  at  one 
of  the  consulates  before  midnight,  and  at  the  same 
times  as  the  announcement  of  the  death  of  the  king. 
The  Prince  Chaufa  was  elected  to  his  father's 
throne,  with  a  half  brother  of  the  late  king  as  coun- 
cilor; and  Prince  George  Washington  becomes  sec- 
ond councilor  in  place  of  his  father,  who  died  in 
1 860,  that  office  having  been  vacant  until  now. 

Page    Ninety-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"To  Christian  teachers  the  late  king  gave  perfect 
freedom  in  their  work  and  by  personal  kindness 
encouraged  them.  Yet,  he  died,  as  he  lived,  a  Bud- 
dhist. Christianity  has  not  flourished  in  Siam.  Per- 
haps it  requires  to  wrestle  with  persecution  in  or- 
der to  grow  vigorously. 

"We  have  croquet  almost  every  evening  except 
Wednesdays,  when  we  go  to  the  English  chapel 
to  practice  the  chants  for  Sunday.  I  am  house- 
keeping and  have  a  good  cook  as  a  general  thing. 
Sometimes,  however,  unhappily  for  me,  to  keep 
his  spirits  up,  he  takes  some  spirits  down.  When 
this  happens,  as  it  did  tonight,  !  get  a  burned  cut- 
let for  dinner.  If  you  perceive  anything  melan- 
choly in  my  writing,  you  may  lay  it  to  the  account 
of  the  cutlet.  This  cook,  by  the  way,  is  the  man 
who  accompanied  M.  Mohot  in  his  explorations, 
and  of  whom  it  is  recorded  in  the  description  de 
Siam'  that  he  drank  the  alcohol  from  a  bottle  of 
preserved  reptiles.  He  still  lives. 

"I  have,  like  you,  many  pets,  but  my  dear,  big, 
beautiful  dog,  was  bitten  by  a  pariah  a  few  days 
ago — so  that — he  died.  I  send  you  his  photograph 
and  beg  you  to  excuse  his  mistress  for  being  pres- 
ent in  it.  He  would  not  sit  without  me,  and  with 
me,  persisted  in  taking  the  attitude  in  which  he  al- 
ways was  when  I  held  didactic  and  reformatory  con- 
versation with  him,  as  you  see  by  the  expression  of 
his  tail.  My  grand  old  Max — I  have  no  consolation 
for  his  death — there  is  no  heaven  for  dogs. 

"I  go  by  boat  to  the  chapel  every  morning  and 

Page   Ninety -Four 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

play  the  squeakiest  of  melodeons.  I  have  some- 
times  in  what  was  called  fine  music,  heard  what 
seemed  to  be  a  discord,  and  been  told,  'that  is  be- 
cause your  ear  is  not  educated.'  I  think  the  ears 
of  the  Chinese  must  be  highly  educated,  for  the 
more  discordant  the  sounds,  the  more  attracted  they 
appear  to  be  to  them.  Well,  so  I  play  on  the 
squeaky  melodeon  until  a  congregation  is  gathered 
from  the  passers-by,  and  then  my  Chinese  assist- 
ant preaches.  Afternoons  I  study  Chinese,  which 
is.  I  think,  worth  learning  for  its  own  sake.  It  is 
the  language  of  almost  half  the  population  of  the 
earth.  I  am  afraid  that  we  shall  not  be  able  to 
speak  Chinese  with  each  other  when  we  meet,  as 
yours  is  a  different  dialect.  However,  we  may  cor- 
respond in  it  as  the  character  is  the  same.  I  some- 
limes  go  out  to  dinners  or  soirees,  but  usually  I 
think  that  your  quiet  moods  might  find  full  oppor- 
tunity for  indulgence. 

"I  am  very  content  here,  but  sometimes  fear  my 
character  develops  in  just  the  opposite  direction  to 
that  of  other  people,  for  as  I  grow  old,  I  grow  less 
fond  of  quietude.  Indeed,  now  that  I  am  old  I 
care  more  for  live  things  and  less  for  books,  though 
I  still  prefer  a  lively  book  to  some  live  people. 

"If  you  see  anyone  I  love  please  tell  them  so. 
The  nearest  and  only  duty  you  need  perform  to 
fulfill  my  request,  is  to  turn  to  the  mirror.  I  have 
a  presentiment  that  I  shall  see  you,  and  that  we 
shall  have  that  'long  talk  in  the  other  room,*  and  I 
cherish  pleasant  things  however  improbable." 

Page   Ninety-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

In  a  report  to  the  Baptist  Board  of  Missionaries, 
written  in  1869,  Miss  Fielde  summarizes  her 
knowledge  of  the  past  achievements,  present  prog- 
ress and  future  probabilities  of  Christianity  in 
Siam,  which  are  far  from  encouraging: 

* 'Reckoning  from  the  first  establishment  of  a 
Christian  mission  among  the  Siamese  in  1 832  until 
now,  not  including  any  women,  nor  any  person 
who  left  the  country  before  having  time  to  acquire 
the  language,  and  making  allowances  for  sickness 
and  other  causes,  there  remains  sixteen  mission- 
aries, averaging  thirteen  years  apiece,  living  among 
and  laboring  to  convert  the  Siamese.  The  number 
of  native  members  in  the  Siamese  Mission  churches 
is  today  less  than  three  to  each  missionary.  These 
native  Christians  are  not  themselves  strong  pro- 
mulgators  of  the  faith  they  have  embraced  but 
must  need  hold  to  the  teacher,  as  well  as  to  the 
teachings  to  keep  from  falling  back  into  heathen- 
ism. Among  the  common  people,  the  half  per- 
suaded are  very  few  and  in  the  high  places  Bud- 
dhism sits  as  firmly  as  it  did  thirty  years  ago.  True, 
intercourse  with  foreign  nations  and  the  study  of 
Western  sciences  has,  among  the  nobles,  destroyed 
some  superstitions.  The  Prime  Minister,  acknow- 
ledged by  all  to  be  an  able  man,  is  a  rank  infidel. 
Others  might  subscribe  themselves  as  did  the  late 
king  to  one  of  the  missionaries,  'Your  friend,  but 
a  sincere  hater  of  Christianity/  Only  a  few  are 

Fage  Ninety-Sir. 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

sufficiently  awake  to  hate;  the  dead,  dread  apathy 
of  Buddhism  is  upon  them. 

"In  considering  what  has  been  done  for  the 
Chinese  here  I  find  fourteen  Protestant  mission- 
aries, under  various  societies,  have  labored  among 
the  Chinese  in  Bangkok.  Of  this  number  three 
have  died  and  three  have  returned  to  the  United 
States  in  less  than  two  years  of  their  arrival  here. 
Of  the  remainder  six  have  removed  to  China. 
Omitting  all  who  have  lived  in  the  country  less 
than  two  years,  there  have  been  seven  male  mis- 
sionaries, averaging  eight  years  each,  who  have 
worked  among  the  Chinese  between  the  years 
1834-1869.  The  present  number  of  nominal  Chi- 
nese Christians  is  eighty. 

"Of  these,  some  I  fear,  would  not  bear  any  true 
test  of  their  Christianity.  To  the  eyes  of  those 
who  look  at  missions  from  the  other  side  of  the 
world,  increase  of  membership  means  progress; 
but  sometimes  people  are  added  to  the  church  when 
there  is  little  in  their  habits  of  thought  and  course 
of  action  to  distinguish  them  from  the  heathen. 
Others  may  work  with  less  evident  results  but  with 
truer  success,  and  give  instruction  to  many  while 
their  church  members  are  few.  If  a  temple  is  of 
hay,  wood  or  stubble,  it  may  build  rapidly,  but  if 
of  polished  stone  the  work  will  be  slow.  But  the 
first  has  the  contempt  of  all  observers  and  decays 
speedily;  the  latter  rises  firmly  and  forever  towards 
heaven. 

"The    statistics    above    are    carefully    compiled, 

Page  Ninety-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

no  one  here  can  dispute  them.  Some  looking  with 
anxious  eyes  would  tell  you  that  the  throne  of 
Buddhism  is  tottering;  but  any  wholly  impartial 
critic  would,  I  think,  say  as  I  have  written.  The 
work  to  be  accomplished  is  as  binding  as  when 
the  command  was  first  given  by  the  risen  Savior, 
'Go  ye  into  all  the  world  and  preach  the  Gospel 
to  every  creature/  There  is  the  promise,  'All  na- 
tions shall  come  and  worship  before  God/  The 
fulfillment  of  the  last  rests  doubtless  upon  our 
obedience  to  the  first,  but  for  every  heavenly  good 
God  demands  a  large  price  in  physical  comfort, 
in  material  substance.  By  asking  such  a  price 
He  teaches  us  to  value  it. 

"It  took  an  army  of  two  millions  of  men  and 
cost  six  billions  of  dollars  to  set  free  three  millions 
of  bondmen  in  America.  Here  in  China  and 
Siam  alone  are  four  hundred  millions  of  people 
in  a  thraldom  far  more  dreadful  than  any  African 
slave — that  of  a  living  soul  bound  to  a  dead  god, 
with  all  the  powers  of  darkness  holding  the  chain. 

"Against  them  are  arrayed  a  force  of  two  hun- 
dred men  and  women.  The  case  is  as  sad  and 
hopeless  as  that  of  the  three  hundred  Spartans 
oppressed  by  the  myriads  of  Xerxes.  It  cannot 
be  done — never  until  a  number  of  men,  such  as 
are  now  unthought  of  are  brought  into  the  field, 
and  with  a  degree  of  devotion  now  undreamed  of 
can  we  hope  'the  kingdom  of  this  world  will  be- 
come the  kingdom  of  our  Lord  and  of  his 
Christ/  ' 

Page  Ninety-Eight 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

It  will  be  seen  from  the  foregoing  that  Miss 
Fielde  had  little  hope  of  missionary  conquest 
from  the  methods  employed  and  the  limited  forces 
available.  She  did  not  despair,  however.  Imme- 
diately she  began  to  contrive  ways  of  overcoming 
this  apparently  unsurmountable  difficulty.  Her 
disciplined  mind  and  her  altruistic  soul  function- 
ing in  unison,  resulted  in  a  new  creation — 'The 
Biblewomen. 

How  long  it  took  for  the  plan  to  fully  realize 
may  be  premised  by  the  time  which  elapsed  be- 
fore it  was  tried  out,  but  more  of  the  Bible 
women  later. 

The  weeks  were  full  of  tasks,  the  monotony 
varied  only  by  incidents,  often  pathetic  and  dis- 
couraging. Some  pleasures  were  experienced 
from  time  to  time.  One  of  these  latter  Miss 
Fielde  described  as  an  excursion  to  Buddhist  tem- 
ples in  January,  1869,  she  says: 

"Miss  Dean  and  I  have  just  returned  from  a 
short  trip  to  Ayuthia,  the  former  capital,  and 
Pra  Bat,  the  supposed  footprints  of  Buddha. 
Three  of  the  Presbyterian  missionaries  and  an 
American  gentleman  were  our  companions.  Our 
three  boats,  with  a  score  of  rowers,  went  in  com- 
pany up-stream.  At  Pra  Bat,  a  day's  journey 
above  Ayuthia.  we  expected  to  obtain  elephants 

Page   Ninety-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

to  ride  out  to  the  sacred  *footprints.'      As  none 
were  available  we  took  horses  instead. 

"Today  has  been  a  Sabbath  full  of  interest,  be- 
cause it  is  interesting  to  look  at  our  daily  surround- 
ings, that  have  become  somewhat  tame  to  us,  with 
the  eyes  of  those  just  from  home.  At  nine  o'clock 
services  at  Wat  Ho  chapel  in  Chinese,  at  which 
Chek  Chong  preached  to  fifty  Chinese;  at  eleven 
English  service  in  the  chapel,  at  which  Mr.  Part- 
ridge preached  to  eight  or  nine  pilots  and  ship  cap- 
tains; at  four  o'clock  service  in  the  English  chapel 
where  all  church-going  Europeans  attend." 

The  last  records  of  her  labors  in  Siam  is  con- 
tained in  a  letter  in  which  she  describes  her  work  as 
f  ollows : 

"Bonplassi,  May  2nd,  1869. 

"I  came  to  Anghin  the  last  of  March  with  the 
wife  of  the  English  physician  at  Bangkok,  and  spent 
three  weeks,  stopping  in  the  house  of  a  Siamese 
nobleman,  then  joined  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Partridge  here. 

"In  the  forenoons,  while  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Partridge 
are  reading  Chinese,  I  go  to  the  native  houses  and 
shops  to  carry  the  people  the  'true  doctrine.'  This 
manner  of  working  does  not  produce  great  and  im- 
mediate effects,  but  it  seems  to  me  to  be  in  accord- 
ance with  the  command,  'Go  and  teach/  I  do  not 
believe  our  Lord  sends  His  servants  on  useless  er- 
rands. I  will  do  mine  as  faithfully  and  as  well  as 
I  can;  results  rest  with  Him." 

Page   One   Hundred 


Life  in  the  Orient;  Missionary  Service 

In  1 869,  Miss  Fielde,  commenting  on  her  life  and 
labors  in  Siam,  takes  a  look  backward,  thus: 

*'In  taking  a  retrospective  view  of  life  in  Siam  on 
the  third  anniversary  of  my  arrival  here,  I  found 
that  I  had  spent  one-third  of  my  time  at  the  out- 
stations  and  other  villages,  the  remainder  in  Bang- 
kok, and  had  distributed  several  hundreds  of  books, 
talking  as  I  was  able,  of  the  Gospel  to  those  to 
whom  I  gave  the  books. 

"During  the  rainy  season  I  have  made  a  study 
of  the  language,  with  my  teacher,  my  chief  work; 
feeling  that  I  could  accomplish  more  in  a  short  time 
with  a  sharp  tool,  than  in  a  longer  time  with  a  dull 
one. 

"The  first  of  June  a  sick  European  child  was 
brought  by  its  father  to  me  to  be  cared  for.  Its 
mother  had  died  and  it  had  suffered  greatly  through 
neglect.  I  hoped  with  care  and  affection  it  would 
soon  grow  well  and  strong,  but  it  had  acquired 
some  wasting  disease  and  grew  more  weary  and 
wailing  each  day.  On  my  being  taken  ill  on  the 
first  of  August,  Mrs.  Smith  kindly  took  the  sick  boy 
to  her  home,  and  when  I  recovered  the  first  of  Sep- 
tember he  had  gone  to  his  own  mother. 

"I  am  quite  well  again  and  as  soon  as  these,  the 
heaviest  of  the  rains,  are  past,  shall  go  out  among 
the  people  again." 

In  a  short  account  of  her  life  in  Siam,  Miss  Fielde 
concludes  by  stating  that  she  left  that  country  in 

Pag-e  One   Hundred   One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

1872.  While  on  her  way  home  she  stopped  for  a 
week's  visit  at  Swatow.  Here  the  European  mis- 
sionaries and  native  converts,  who  spoke  the  same 
Chinese  dialect  that  she  had  learned,  implored  her 
to  return  to  them.  This  she  promised  to  do  if  such 
an  arrangement  could  be  made. 


Page  One  Hundred  Two 


CHAPTER  NINE 
Vacation;  In  the  Lecture  Field;  Return  to  Swatow 

(The  following  verse  was  taken  from  the  Public  Ledger  of 
Philadelphia  of  November  oth,  1887,  and  was  written  by  a  person 
who  had  never  seen  Miss  Fielde  but  had  read  some  of  her  letters): 

"TO   A.    M.    F.    SWATOW,    CHINA. 

"Ah!  Swatow's  clime   is  far  away! 

A  Chinese  vapor  wreathes  its  hills, 
A  Chinese  sun  inflames  its  day, 

By   night  a   Chinese  moon   distils 
A  weird  and  mystic  light  that  chills 

The   Western   heart   that   still   must   stay 
Its    time   mid  loneliness   that   kills — 

Ah!   Swatow's  clime   is  far  away! 

"L'    ENVOI. 
"Princess,  timy   flies!      The  worst  of  ills 

Is  anodyned  by  Hope's  sweet  ray; 
With   calm   this  thought  each   bosom   fills. 
But  Swatow's   clime   is  far  away! 

"E.    R." 

BEYOND  the  fact  that  Miss  Fielde  spent  six 
months  in  the  United  States  and  six  months 
in  Europe,  few  details  are  known  as  to  how 
she  passed  her  year's  vacation.  That  she  left  Siam 
permanently  in  1 872  is  plainly  stated  in  letters  now 
extant ;  but  it  is  reasonable  to  presume  that  she  did 
not  sever  her  connection  with  the  Baptist  Board  of 
Foreign  Missions  at  that  lime.  No  mention  of  her 
European  tour  is  contained  in  any  of  her  published 
articles,  letters  to  friends  or  diaries  of  that  period. 
That  she  delivered  a  series  of  lectures  on  the  Orient 
and  on  her  personal  experiences  as  a  Christian  mis- 
sionary to  the  heathen  is  a  matter  of  record  as  well 
as  a  matter  of  recollection  to  a  number  of  her  form- 
er friends,  who  still  reside  in  New  York  City.  It 

Page   One   Hundred   Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

was  on  one  of  these  occasions,  in  a  talk  made  be- 
fore the  congregation  of  the  Fifth  Avenue  Baptist 
Church,  that  she  met  Mrs.  E.  M.  Cauldwell,  with 
whom  she  established  an  intimate  friendship  which 
persisted  until  Mrs.  Cauldwell's  death  in  1912. 

In  February,  1873,  we  find  Miss  Fielde  again  in 
the  Orient.  This  time  she  took  up  her  residence  at 
Swatow,  which  fulfilled  her  promise  to  the  Chris- 
tian Chinese  women,  made  the  year  previous.  Swa- 
tow is  a  city  of  Southern  China,  about  a  thousand 
miles  from  Bangkok.  At  that  time  it  contained  a 
population  of  thirty  thousand  inhabitants  and  was 
an  importing  center  for  surrounding  cities  aggre- 
gating over  a  million  people.  On  the  southeastern 
coast  of  China,  about  half  way  between  Hongkong 
and  Amoy,  at  the  eastern  end  of  the  Kwangtung 
province,  and  just  south  of  the  Tropic  of  Cancer, 
is  the  bay  on  which  Swatow  is  situated,  five  miles 
from  the  sea.  Outside  the  mouth  of  the  bay  are  the 
Lamocks,  on  which  wrecks  are  frequent.  Just 
within  the  mouth  is  Double  Island,  formerly  the  seat 
of  the  iniquitous  cooley  traffic,  and  also  the  resi- 
dence of  the  first  foreign  comers  to  the  port.  It  is 
now  occupied  chiefly  by  the  families  of  the  foreign 
pilots,  who  bring  the  ships  into  Swatow  Harbor. 
Being  ten  degrees  cooler  than  Swatow,  it  has  be- 
come a  resort  and  a  retreat  for  enfeebled  foreigners 

Page  One  Hundred  Four 


Vacation;  In  the  Lecture  Field;  Return  to  Swatow 

during  the  hottest  months.  Here  many  of  the  for- 
eign merchants  and  officials  have  constructed  homes 
for  occupancy  during  the  months  of  torrid  weather, 
and  several  of  the  foreign  missions  have  built  hos- 
pitals. It  was  here  that  Miss  Fielde  built  Fielde 
Lodge,  the  final  important  work  of  her  hands  while 
in  China.  Fielde  Lodge  was  made  of  concrete  with 
a  tile  roof.  It  contained  a  small  number  of  large 
rooms,  constructed  with  a  view  of  admitting  the 
continuous  passage  of  an  abundance  of  cool  air. 
It  is  used  as  a  resthouse  and  sanitorium  for  weary 
and  ill  missionaries  and  missionary  workers.  Miss 
Fielde  made  the  plans  of  the  lodge  herself  and  di- 
rected the  work  of  building  personally.  Also  she 
was  instrumental  in  securing  the  needed  money — 
about  eighteen  hundred  dollars,  the  larger  portion 
of  which  was  contributed  by  Mrs.  E.  M.  Cauldwell, 
of  New  York.  When  the  building  was  complete 
and  ready  for  occupancy,  Miss  Fielde  wrote  Mrs. 
Cauldwell  asking  that  lady  to  permit  her  to  christen 
it  "Cauldwell  Lodge,"  but  Mrs.  Cauldwell  instruct- 
ed that  it  be  called  "Fielde  Lodge/*  Miss  Fielde  was 
the  first  occupant  of  the  lodge,  she  having  gone 
there  in  1889  to  recuperate  from  illness  due  to  fe- 
ver. In  1886  Miss  Fielde  wrote: 

"The  outlook  over  the  bay  from  the  hilltops,  tak- 
ing in  the  blue  inlets,  the  fertile  ravines,  the  barren 

Page  One  Hundred   Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

slopes,  glistening  gray  and  golden  in  the  sunset, 
is  as  fine  as  that  of  the  Bay  of  Naples  from  Vesu- 
vius. But  there  is  no  exhilaration  in  the  view ;  for 
visible  to  the  eye  within  its  range,  and  visible  to 
the  heart,  whose  perception  extends  to  the  limits  of 
the  empire,  on  and  on  from  this  southern  border 
of  the  land  away  and  away  to  Siberia,  lie  thickly 
the  low  gray  villages,  made  up  of  filthy  huts  and 
dingy  alleys,  and  in  each  men  count  themselves 
fortunate,  if,  by  daily  toil  like  beasts,  they  win  daily 
bread;  and  women  weep  for  wrongs  that  no  one 
thinks  of  rectifying;  and  children  seldom  smile,  be- 
cause unconsciously  they  face  the  vast  burden  of 
life  and  are  awed  by  it  into  solemnity.  The  sharp 
struggle  for  life  goes  on  under  the  incubus  of  pagan- 
ism, whereby  all  are  crushed  into  brutishness.  The 
crowning  glory  of  creation  is  its  noble  and  happy 
human  beings,  and  where  these  are  not,  Nature 
lacks  exalting  charm.  The  beauteous  scenery  loses 
power  to  delight,  when  haunted  by  base,  sad  souls. 
So  it  comes  to  pass  that  the  bright  waters  and  ferny 
mountains  of  China  communicate  no  joy. 

"The  low  latitude  puts  this  region  where  roses 
bloom  in  mid-winter ;  the  banyans  and  bamboos  are 
always  green.  In  the  summer,  which  are  at  least 
six  months  long,  the  heat  indoors  often  rises,  and 
stays  even  through  the  nights,  above  ninety  de- 
grees. Though  the  temperature  is  lower  than  in 
many  places  further  north,  the  long  continuance  of 
the  heat,  with  the  shortness  of  the  cool  season, 
makes  the  climate  exhaustive.  It  is  said  by  experi- 

Paere  One  Hundred  Six 


Vacation;  In  the  Lecture  Field;  Return  to  Swatow 

enced  physicians  that  foreigners  should  not  remain 
here  longer  than  seven  years  at  a  stretch.  The  Eng- 
lish Presbyterian  Board  not  only  permits,  but  re- 
quires, its  representatives  to  return  home  for  recu- 
peration at  the  end  of  each  seven  years  of  service; 
while  the  foreigners  in  the  consulates  and  commer- 
cial firms  rarely  stay  more  than  five  years.  As  xa 
residence  for  the  white  race,  Swatow  is,  however, 
reckoned  as  one  of  the  most  salubrious  in  the  Far 
East. 

"Swatow  is  not  walled,  it  has  the  ordinary  two- 
yard  wide  streets,  bordered  by  one-story  shops,  hav- 
ing their  whole  fronts  open  for  trade.  Centrally 
in  the  town  is  the  Yamun,  the  official  residence  and 
court  house  for  the  local  magistracy.  I  have  seen  in 
its  yard  crosses  on  which  men  had  just  been 
crucified.  In  the  outskirts  of  the  town  is  a  spot 
where  two  criminals  were,  a  few  years  ago,  buried 
alive. 

"This  port  stands  as  the  fifth  in  China  in  the  im- 
port of  opium  and  over  five  hundred  thousand 
pounds  of  the  drug  are  yearly  brought  in.  The  for- 
eign population  consists  of  the  several  consuls  with 
attaches;  some  merchants,  with  complements  of 
clerks ;  an  Imperial  customs  commissioner  and  staff ; 
a  physician,  who  practices  in  the  foreign  com- 
munity and  has  charge  of  the  hospital  for  English 
sailors  and  pilots.  These,  with  the  wives  and  chil- 
dren, a  dozen  members  of  the  English  Presbyterian 
mission,  the  half  dozen  members  of  the  American 
Baptist  Mission,  and  eleven  Roman  Catholic  priests, 

Page  One  Hundred  Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

make  the  foreign  population  of  Swatow  one  hun- 
dred and  twenty  persons. 

* 'On  the  south  side  of  the  bay,  which  is  a  mile 
wide,  is  the  American  Baptist  Mission,  on  a  hill 
made  verdant  and  picturesque  by  trees  planted 
among  its  rocks.  It  has  a  chapel,  a  theological 
school,  a  Biblewomen's  training  school,  a  boys' 
school,  a  girls'  school,  and  the  homes  of  its  mission- 
aries. The  mission  has  thirty  outstations  in  the 
country,  and  eight  or  nine  hundred  church  mem- 
bers. 

"In  the  south  of  China,  no  foreigners  live  in 
houses  of  the  native  pattern.  Chinese  dwellings 
are  but  one  story ;  their  best  floors  are  made  of  tiles 
laid  on  the  ground,  and  are  usually  unlighted  by 
any  aperture  except  the  door.  They  have  no  glass 
windows  and  are  crowded  closely  together,  upon 
narrow  alleys,  where  all  the  sewage  of  the  neighbor- 
hood visibly  flows,  so  that  the  street  gives  in  as 
obnoxious  odors  as  the  house  gives  out.  The  China- 
man is  a  splendid  example  of  the  gradual  adaptation 
of  the  physical  constitution  to  its  environment.  He 
is  as  happy  in  foul  air  as  a  fish  in  water,  and  lives 
to  a  good  old  age  in  a  stench  which  would  be  fatal 
to  an  American  within  a  week. 

"Here  in  Swatow  our  houses  are  built  chiefly 
of  native  material;  but  on  a  homelike  plan.  Con- 
siderable experience  in  building  houses  for  foreign- 
ers has  made  some  of  the  native  artisans  skillful  in 
this  sort  of  work,  and  it  is  now  possible  to  have  a 
comfortable  dwelling  without  the  extreme  wear  and 

Page  One  Hundred  Eight 


Vacation;  In  the  Lecture  Field;  Return  to  Swatow 

tear  of  health,  spirit  and  temper,  which  ten  or 
twelve  years  ago  made  house-building  an  appalling 
enterprise.  There  are  a  few  native  carpenters  who 
make  furniture  from  pine,  camphor-wood,  or  teak, 
imitating,  with  fair  success,  the  foreign  pattern 
given  them.  Native  weavers  make  straw  matting 
for  the  floors,  and  if  one  has  pictures,  books  and 
bric-a-brac,  he  can  make  a  house  here  look  much 
like  a  home  in  the  dear,  distant  fatherland. 

"And,  of  course,  one  must  eat.  Firstly,  we  make 
use  of  available  native  products.  From  the  water- 
buffalo  and  the  zebu,  milk,  in  small  quantities,  and 
of  poor  quality,  is  procured.  The  Chinese  do  not 
use  milk  except  as  a  strengthening  medicine.  In 
Swatow,  a  hundred  and  twenty  foreign  residents 
are  a  sufficient  number  to  make  a  butcher's  trade 
profitable,  the  zebu  is  fattened  and  the  flesh  sold. 
Both  prejudice  and  economy  deter  the  Chinese  from 
the  slaughter  of  cattle  as  food  for  themselves,  but 
they  eat  the  flesh  of  such  as  die  by  disease  or  acci- 
dent. Pork,  without  which  no  Chinese  feast  is 
served,  is  rarely  used  by  us,  because  we  know  on 
what  garbage  the  animal  is  fed.  I  have  not  myself 
partaken  of  this  viand  since  early  in  my  missionary 
life  I  saw  a  pig  feeding  on  an  infant. 

"I  think  there  are  few  places  in  the  world  where 
domestic  help  is  so  efficient  at  its  cost  as  here  in 
Southern  China.  The  bound  feet  of  the  women 
make  them  useless  in  occupations  requiring  activity, 
and  men  are  employed  for  all  indoor  as  well  as  out- 
door work.  Women  are  engaged  for  the  care  of 

Page  One  Hundred  Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

children  only.  A  man,  taken  in  the  rough,  and 
trained  as  cook,  often  becomes  as  skillful  in  the 
kitchen  as  his  instructress,  and  remains  with  her 
for  a  lifetime,  thankful  to  be  established  in  a  voca- 
tion wherein  he  earns  twice  as  much  as  among  his 
own  people.  His  wages  when  serving  his  foreign 
teacher,  is  five  or  six  dollars  a  month,  boarding 
himself.  General  housework  is  done  for  four  dol- 
lars a  month.  Washing  is  a  distinct  business. 

*'A  new  England  woman  'of  faculty,'  would,  in 
her  own  home,  with  its  labor-saving  inventions, 
easily  do  as  much  housework  as  is  done  here  by 
four  Chinese  domestics." 

The  Baptist  mission  at  Swatow  was  far  more  pre- 
tentious than  the  one  at  Bangkok.  It  covered  a 
much  larger  territory  and  employed  a  greater  num- 
ber of  workers.  During  Miss  Fielde's  residence  at 
Swatow  the  mission  was  under  the  direction  of  Dr. 
William  Ashmore,  who  bears  the  enviable  reputa- 
tion of  being  one  of  the  most  efficient  and  success- 
ful foreign  missionaries  in  the  entire  history  of 
missionary  service. 


Page   One    Hundred   Ten 


CHAPTER  TEN 
The  "Biblewomen" 

MISS  FIELDE'S  work  in  Swatow  was  essenti- 
ally different  from  that  in  Siam.  At  Bang- 
kok, aside  from  her  routine  missionary 
duties,  she  spent  her  surplus  time  and  energies  in 
learning  the  Chinese  language  and  studying  the  pe- 
culiarities of  the  Chinese  character.  In  other 
words,  she  equipped  herself  for  broader  fields  of 
endeavor.  In  Swatow,  under  the  liberal  superin- 
tendency  of  Reverend  William  Ashmore,  her  pow- 
ers of  initiation  were  given  full  rein  and  she  was 
encouraged  to  experiment  with  progressive  meth- 
ods, even  if  such  procedure  required  radical  depar- 
ture from  long  established  plans  of  missionary 
work.  Here  she  conceived  a  plan,  which,  in  a  meas- 
ure, revolutionized  the  missionary  service  in  the 
Far  East.  This  innovation  is  comprehensively  de- 
scribed as  the  "Biblewomen"  plan  and  consisted  in 
organizing,  instructing  and  sending  out  native 
women  to  do  the  pioneer  work  of  evangelization — 
work,  which  heretofore  had  been  done  by  the  white 
missionaries,  assisted  by  Bible  teachers  and  inter- 
preters. 

Chinese  women  are  woefully  ignorant,  far  more 
so  than  Chinese  men.  Not  more  than  one  in  a 
thousand  is  able  to  read  and  their  social  customs 

Page  One  Hundred  Eleven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

are  such  that  they  are  invariably  excluded  from 
public  gatherings  where  current  events  are  dis- 
cussed by  those  of  advanced  intelligence.  They  are 
not  supposed  to  be  capable  of  understanding  things 
of  greater  complexity  than  those  pertaining  to  the 
common  physical  needs  and  desires  of  mankind; 
and  topics  of  conversation  in  their  presence  are 
limited  accordingly.  As  a  consequence  they  suffer 
from  mind  starvation  and  are  uniformly  eager  and 
avid  for  any  scrap  of  information  or  piece  of  news 
that  may  be  thrown  their  way.  Because  of  this, 
gossip  has  been  cultivated  to  such  an  extent  that 
with  them  it  is  both  a  science  and  an  art.  They 
charge  their  minds  with  every  passing  event,  and 
then,  when  favorable  opportunity  presents  itself, 
confide  every  detail  of  their  experience  and  obser- 
vation to  neighboring  women,  female  friend  or 
acquaintance.  Nothing  is  so  unimportant  or  com- 
monplace that  it  will  not  bear  endless  repetition 
and  be  regarded  as  an  almost  inexhaustible  source 
of  entertainment. 

Miss  Fielde  noted  this  habit  and  used  it  to  a 
very  good  advantage,  indeed.  She  prepared  and 
wrote  in  Chinese  a  dozen  or  more  Gospel  les- 
sons, each  of  which  embodied  one  or  more  of  the 
cardinal  principles  of  Christianity,  illuminated  by 
excerpts  from  the  personal  history  of  the  Savior. 

Page  One  Hundred  Twelve 


The  "Biblewomen" 

Then  she  carefully  selected  a  corps  of  the  more 
intelligent  Chinese  women  with  whom  she  came  in 
contact  and  placed  them  on  the  missionary  pay 
roll.  Thus  organized,  she  proceeded  to  teach  and 
train  her  prospective  co-workers.  With  compara- 
tively little  labor  she  readily  impressed  them  with 
the  advantages  of  a  doctrine  that  promulgated  the 
practice  of  love,  by  contrasting  the  Chinese  ideal 
with  their  own  loveless  estate.  But  the  personality 
of  the  white  man's  God  was  far  more  difficult  to 
comprehend.  The  Chinese  inherit  a  belief  in 
devils,  demons  and  evil  spirits — the  dire  sources 
of  all  bodily  affliction,  moral  degeneration  and 
mental  disorder.  Their  prayers  had  always 
been  made  to  these  imaginary  agencies  with  a  view 
of  softening  their  own  fate  by  propitiating  the  pow- 
ers that  were  supposed  to  oppress  them.  It  was 
hard  to  find  reason  for  worshipping  a  beneficent 
God.  If  He  loved  them,  they  claimed,  He  would 
confer  benefits  voluntarily,  and  certainly  would  not 
harm  them;  tributes  of  praise  and  acts  of  service 
for  the  worship  of  a  good  God  seemed  to  them  to 
be  wasted. 

It  required  a  high  degree  of  keen  and  discrimi- 
nating logic  to  meet  these  arguments,  but  Miss 
Fielde  was  equal  to  the  emergency.  With  inex- 
haustible patience  she  labored  with  her  pupils  until 

Page   One  Hundred   Thirteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

success  came;  and,  then,  what  a  change!  From 
Pantheism  to  Christianity  is  a  long  step,  especially 
so  when  taken  by  a  Mongolian  neophyte.  The 
religious  cult  and  moral  code  of  the  Chinese  differ 
greatly  from  those  of  the  Europeans.  Doubtlessly 
the  yellow  man  possesses  the  same  soul  attributes 
as  those  of  his  white  brother;  but  with  the  former 
they  are  potential,  not  actual;  latent,  not  active. 
True,  the  pagan  is  often  good  natured,  hospitable 
and  kindly  disposed,  but  he  is  very  seldom  self- 
sacrificing.  His  cultural  inheritance,  founded  on 
Buddhism,  Shintoism,  Tauism  and  Confusianic 
philosophy,  tends  to  develop  self-concern  rather 
than  social  virtue. 

Those  familiar  with  the  sordid  lives  of  the  middle 
class  Chinese  women,  their  inherited  prejudices,  ap- 
palling ignorance  and  conservative  habits  of 
thought,  look  upon  Miss  Fielde's  conversion  and 
training  of  the  Biblewomen  as  almost  miraculous; 
not  because  of  the  patience  and  application,  but  be- 
cause of  the  great  faith  required  to  attempt  it.  But 
she  did  her  work  well,  as  the  changed  personalities 
of  her  converts  amply  attested.  Formerly  they 
were  dirty,  sullen,  suspicious,  and  mendacious. 
Under  her  tutelage  they  became  cleanly  in  their  per- 
sonal habits,  of  cheerful  demeanor,  kindly  in  their 
treatment  of  others,  and  truthful.  Edward  F.  Mer~ 

Page  One  Hundred  Fourteen 


The  "Biblewomen" 

riam,   in  his  history  of   "American   Baptist   Mis- 
sions," says  of  the  Biblewomen  of  Swatow: 

"A  leading  spirit  of  the  last  twenty  years  at 
Swatow  has  been  Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde.  A  special 
feature  of  her  work  has  been  the  Biblewomen 
as  developed  under  her  efficient  leadership.  It  was 
Miss  Fielde' s  practice  to  gather  Christian  women 
for  instruction  and  to  teach  them  thoroughly  one 
lesson  from  the  Gospel.  When  they  had  learned 
it,  she  sent  them  out,  two  by  two,  into  the  country 
about  to  tell  the  lesson  to  the  villagers.  After  a 
time  they  were  gathered  at  Swatow  and  received  an- 
other portion  of  the  truth  and  having  obtained  a 
thorough  grasp  of  it,  went  forth  to  carry  the  good 
news  of  salvation.  By  these  methods  Miss  Fielde 
built  up  an  organized  corps  of  Biblewomen  whose 
work,  under  her  direction,  has  been  a  model  for 
the  work  of  Biblewomen  throughout  China.  In 
the  later  years,  the  little  country  churches,  which 
were  first  considered  branches  of  Swatow  church, 
have  been  organized  into  independent  churches. 
Several  new  stations  have  been  established,  and  as 
supplementary  to  the  organization  of  the  churches 
and  the  excellent  work  of  the  Biblewomen,  a  sys- 
tem of  Bible  study  at  central  points  in  the  country 
districts  has  been  inaugurated  by  the  Rev.  John  M. 
Foster,  in  order  to  reach  the  members  of  the 
churches  who  are  unable  to  visit  Swatow.  These 
Bible  classes  are  maintained  for  a  month,  the  most 
intelligent  of  the  church  members  being  gathered 
for  that  purpose.  By  these  admirable  and  efficient 

Page  One  Hundred  Fifteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

means  of  organization;  with  elders  in  every  little 
church;  with  the  leading  members  trained  in  Bible 
study;  and  Biblewomen  taught  in  the  Word,  the 
Southern  China  mission  has  been  welded  into  an  ef- 
fective force  for  carrying  on  the  work  of  the  Gospel 
among  the  people  in  these  neighborhoods,  and 
reaches  out  into  the  region  beyond." 

Under  the  caption,  "Women's  Work  for 
Women,"  in  the  Encyclopedia  of  Missions,  Rev. 
Edwin  Munsell  Bliss  writes: 

"The  Biblewomen  are  not  selected  because  they 
offer  themselves,  but  are  sought  out  and  invited  be- 
cause of  their  adaptability  and  Christian  thorough- 
ness, and  are  trained  and  superintended  by  Miss 
Fielde,  who  has  a  cottage  for  herself  and  a  house  for 
the  Biblewomen  containing  good  class-rooms  and 
accommodation  for  thirty  persons.  Once  a  year 
they  return  for  three  months*  Bible  instruction, 
living  in  houses  provided  by  the  Mission.  Women 
go  fifty  and  sixty  miles  from  Swatow,  sometimes 
staying  two  and  three  days  in  a  village. 

"Perpetual  contact  with  the  heathen  benumbs 
their  consciousness,  so  they  need  a  quickening  in- 
fluence of  a  new  view  of  their  Lord.  This  is  the 
reason  for  their  frequent  return  to  the  missions. 
They  eat  and  dress  as  poorly  as  the  women  to 
whom  they  go.  Educational  work  around  Swatow 
is  carried  on  vigorously." 

In  an  "Annual  Letter  to  Helpers  in  America," 
Miss  Fielde  writes  of  the  Biblewomen: 

Page   One   Hundred   Sixteen 


The  "Biblewomen" 

"During  the  present  year  sixteen  native  female 
evangelists  have  been  constantly  employed,  under 
my  direction,  in  the  outstations  of  this  mission,  at 
distances  varying  from  five  to  fifty  miles  from 
Swatow.  The  women  spend  nine  weeks  in  each 
quarter  of  the  year,  at  the  outstations  to  which 
they  are  respectively  sent;  then,  one  week  at  their 
own  homes,  and  two  weeks  here  in  class.  At  the 
quarterly  conference  they  receive  instruction  in 
that  which  they  teach  to  other  women,  render  re- 
ports of  their  work  at  the  stations,  and  confer  with 
the  misssionaries  and  with  each  other,  upon  the  af- 
fairs of  the  church  and  the  church  members.  The 
lessons  given  them  at  the  four  conferences  of  the 
past  year  have  been  four  series  of  ten  lessons  each : 
the  first  on  the  Ten  Commandments;  the  second 
on  Cross  Bearing;  the  third  on  Truthfulness;  and 
the  fourth  on  the  Attributes  of  God.  They  have 
also  learned  a  little  geography  from  maps,  and  have 
had  lectures,  made  comprehensible  to  them  by 
views  through  a  microscope  upon  the  foes  to  life 
in  dirty  air  and  water.  The  microscope  has  as- 
sisted in  the  difficult  work  of  persuading  Chinese 
women  that  cleanliness  has  a  relationship  to  Godli- 
ness. 

"Twenty  of  our  outstations  have  been  used  as 
centers  from  which  to  work  in  the  surrounding  vil- 
lages. In  the  beginning  the  Biblewomen  went  out 
by  twos;  but  the  demand  for  their  work  being  al- 
ways greater  than  the  supply,  I  have  lately  sent  out 
only  one  Biblewoman  to  each  station,  after  engag- 

Page   One  Hundred   Seventeen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ing  a  Christian  woman  belonging  to  that  station  to 
act  as  local  guide  to  the  Biblewoman.  A  local 
guide,  acquainted  with  the  meandering  paths  lead- 
ing to  the  native  hamlets,  is  a  necessary  adjunct 
to  each  Biblewoman 's  work.  The  number  of  vil- 
lages that  can  be  visited  by  the  two  women  de- 
pends upon  the  distance  from  the  chapel  in  which 
the  two  women  lodge,  and  upon  weather.  The 
average,  throughout  the  year,  has  been  seventeen 
different  villages  for  each  Biblewoman  during 
each  quarter,  with  fifty-eight  different  families, 
where  each  woman  has  found  an  opportunity  for 
a  prolonged  exposition  of  the  Scriptures  to  the 
household  and  neighbors. 

"On  Sundays,  before  or  after  the  usual  service 
conducted  by  a  native  preacher,  the  Biblewomen 
teach  the  native  Christian  women  at  the  chapels, 
and  in  this  way  five  hundred  and  forty-two  differ- 
ent women  have  received  instruction  at  our  chapels 
during  the  year. 

"The  Biblewomen  selected  and  employed  by 
me  have  been  Khue  (Speed),  Yong  (Tolerance), 
Mui  (Minute),  Kem  Pheng  (Tapestry),  Sui  Lang 
(Herb),  Gek  (Gem),  Ngun  Hue  (Silver  Flower), 
Phie  (Cress),  Chia  (Rectitude),  Gueh  Eng  (Moon- 
light), Sai  Kio  (Grace),  Lau  Sit  (Innocence),  Niu 
(Button),  Tit  Kim  (Goldgetter) ,  Chut  (Guide), 
Long  (Opulence),  Tien  Chu  (Pearl),  Sui  Khim 
(Lute). 

"The  training  school  for  Biblewomen  is  con- 
tinued through  the  year,  with  no  vacation,  with  an 

Page  One  Hundred  Eighteen 


The  "Biblewomen" 

average  number  of  seven  students  and  with  Chin 
Po  (Treasure)  as  house  mother  and  assistant 
teacher.  The  studies  have  been  wholly  in  the  New 
Testament,  with  stories  from  the  Old.  During  the 
autumn  all  in  the  class  has  accompanied  me  to 
neighboring  villages,  that  I  might  test  the  ability  of 
each  and  give  each  practical  suggestions,  in  speak- 
ing to  pagan  women.  Four  of  the  class  will  do 
Biblewomen's  work  next  year. 

"The  Biblewomen  are  paid  two  dollars  a  month 
and  traveling  expenses;  the  local  guides  five  cents 
a  day  and  traveling  expenses,  the  latter  amounting 
to  about  seventy-five  cents  every  three  months; 
the  students  in  class  a  dollar  and  a  half  a  month, 
as  allowance  for  the  cost  of  food. 

"The  superintendence  of  the  Biblewomen  has 
become  much  less  wearing  to  me  than  formerly, 
because  the  women  have  grown  in  grace  and  in 
knowledge  of  the  truth,  and  I  now  rely  much  upon 
their  helpful  wisdom  and  patience  in  the  manage- 
ment of  all  trying  cases  that  arise.  They  are  a  per- 
petual joy  to  me.  Their  abilities  and  nobilities  have 
increased  with  the  passage  of  time  and  I  have  a 
score,  at  least,  of  Chinese  women  within  my  sphere 
of  life,  who  are  engaging  and  estimable  associates 
in  all  good  work  and  aspiration.  Could  you  dis- 
cern, as  do  I,  the  blessed  changes  that  the  touch  of 
Christ  has  produced  in  these  women,  their  furrowed 
faces  would  be  as  beautiful  in  your  eyes  as  they 
are  in  mine,  because  you  would  recognize  therein 
His  growing  image." 

Page  One  Hundred  Nineteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Many  stories  and  personal  incidents  of  the  Bible- 
women  are  contained  in  Miss  Fielde's  written  arti- 
cles, missionary  reports  and  in  her  book,  'Pagoda 
Shadows,"  which  are  highly  interesting,  noting,  as 
they  do,  periodic  progress  in  the  advancement  of 
civilization  and  development  of  Christianity  on  the 
part  of  the  women.  In  a  magazine  article  printed 
in  Boston  in  1888,  Miss  Fielde  writes: 

"The  light  of  truth  shining  in  the  heart  enables 
one  to  look  beond  the  narrow  circle  of  private  in- 
terest, and  to  appreciate  services  to  those  who  are 
far  off.  The  native  converts,  who  have  but  re- 
cently become  acquainted  with  the  true  God,  are 
apt  to  pray  for  benefits  to  themselves  and  their  kin- 
dred. The  more  advanced  Christians  supplicate 
blessings  for  the  whole  human  race.  A  true  pa- 
triotism, caring  for  the  unknown  masses  through- 
out the  empire,  is  manifested  in  the  aspirations  of 
those  in  whom  grace  has  wrought  long  and  deeply. 

"Treasure,  the  house  mother  in  the  training 
school  for  native  Biblewomen,  said  to  me  yester- 
day, 'I  often  observe  the  courtesy  shown  towards 
ladies  by  the  American  and  English  gentlemen  here, 
and  wish  that  my  country  women  were  treated  by 
their  men  folks  with  like  respect.  I  hope  within  a 
hundred  years  or  more?,  when  Christianity  shall 
have  come  to  cleanse  our  hearts  and  change  our 
manners,  the  Chinese  wives  may  walk  out  with 
their  husbands,  and  go  with  them  to  meetings,  and 
that  those  who  are  married  may  not  be  ashamed  to 

Page  One  Hundred  Twenty 


The  "Biblewomen" 

have  others  see  that  they  like  to  talk  with  each 
other,  and  are  good  friends.' 

"Treasure  did  not  expect  that  such  good  times 
would  come  to  her  country  women  during  her  day, 
but  she  looked  with  long  range  faith  down  the  cen- 
turies, and  foresaw  a  well-being  for  those  who  are 
to  come.  This  love  of  others  leads  her  to  work  and 
to  endure,  and  makes  the  childless  teacher  the 
mother  of  future  multitudes  among  the  faithful.'* 

In  expatiating  on  the  opinions  of  "Speed,"  an- 
other Biblewoman,  Miss  Fielde  says  in  another 
printed  article: 

"Speed  says:  'A  family  is  like  a  tub;  it  cannot 
be  one  unless  all  the  parts  are  in  place.  The  hoops 
support  the  staves,  and  the  staves  support  the 
hoops;  and  if  either  portion  fails  in  its  duty,  the 
whole  is  scattered.  It  is  only  when  each  member 
is  staunch,  firm  and  in  correct  position,  that  the 
household  is  complete.  The  wife  and  mother  is 
like  the  hoops  of  the  tub,  when  she  fails  to  hold  her 
proper  place  there  is  a  breaking  up  of  the  whole. 
She  should,  therefore,  be  honored  for  her  useful- 
ness. 

'When  I  and  my  husband  were  first  married, 
both  being  Christians,  we  ate  together,  and  all  our 
neighbors  laughed  at  us.  A  woman  once  came  to 
me  and  asked  if  I  did  not  know  that  I  ought  to  be 
ashamed  of  myself  for  walking  along  the  street 
with  my  husband  when  we  were  on  our  way  to 
church.  She  said  that  everybody  scorns  us  on  this 

Page   One   Hundred   Twenty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

account,  and  that  she  considered  herself  as  doing  a 
good  deed  in  telling  me  that  I  had  better  adhere 
to  the  native  custom.  But  I  replied  to  her  that 
marriage  was  instituted  by  God  himself,  and  that 
my  own  marriage  was  arranged  for  me  by  the  elders 
of  my  family ;  and  if  my  husband  and  myself  were 
ashamed  of  having  been  married,  then  we  should 
fail  in  piety  and  in  filial  duty,  for  we  would  dis- 
esteem  the  ordinance  of  God  and  the  decision  of 
our  elders.  I  asked  her  if  it  was  better  for  a  man 
to  go  beside  his  wife  and  mother  in  the  street,  or 
to  lead  along  a  courtesan  as  so  many  men  are  proud 
to  do,  because  that  shows  that  they  have  money 
to  spend.  When  one  is  ashamed  of  what  is  right, 
it  will  not  be  long  before  one  is  proud  of  doing 
wrong.  When  I  had  finished  my  argument,  the 
woman  said  that  I  was  correct  in  my  ideas,  and 
apologized  to  me  for  having  told  me  that  I  ought 
to  be  ashamed  of  myself.  When  Christians  are 
fearless  in  following  Christian  customs  the  heath- 
en gradually  come  to  see  that  the  Christians  are 
right.*  " 


Pag-e   One  Hundred  Twenty-Two 


CHAPTER  ELEVEN 

Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature;  The  True 

God;  After  Death;  Life  of  Jesus;  Book 

of  Genesis;  Swatow  Dictionary 

SEVERAL  of  Miss  Fielde's  co-workers  in  mis- 
sionary service  have  expressed  the  belief  that 
Miss  Fielde's  contributions  to  Chinese  litera- 
ture were  fully  equal  in  volume  to  her  English  pro- 
ductions. That  may  or  may  not  be  true,  but  it  is 
certain  that  she  wrote  several  books,  and  a  large 
number  of  tracts,  pamphlets  and  leaflets  in  Chinese. 
It  is  also  said  of  her  that  her  command  of  the  Chinese 
language  has  seldom  been  surpassed  by  persons  of 
European  birth  and  education.  She  was  naturally 
a  linguist  and  after  five  years'  residence  in  the 
Orient,  she  could  read,  write  and  think  in  Chinese 
almost  as  readily  as  in  English.  China,  like  all 
other  nations,  is  not  exempt  from  provincialisms. 
That  vast  country  is  politically  divided  into  a  large 
number  of  provinces,  each  province  having  a  dia- 
lect peculiar  to  itself.  So  distinct  are  the  linguistic 
differences  that  a  person  belonging  to  one  province 
is  often  unable  to  make  himself  understood  by  the 
people  of  an  adjoining  province,  yet  the  written 
characters  of  the  language  are  the  same  throughout 
the  whole  of  Mongolia. 

Miss  Fielde  learned  to  speak  in  the  Swatow  dia- 

Page  One  Hundred   Twenty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

lect  but  from  books  she  acquired  a  writing  know- 
ledge of  Chinese  that  was  nation-wide.  This  she 
found  valuable  in  training  the  Bible  women.  It 
was  her  practice  to  first  write  a  Gospel  lesson  in 
terms  understandable  to  the  ordinary  native  intelli- 
gence and  then  teach  its  oral  recitation  to  her  class. 
As  soon  as  the  members  had  severally  learned  to 
repeat  it,  she  taught  each  to  read  it,  having  a  plen- 
tiful supply  of  the  texts  printed  for  that  purpose. 
So  apt  were  her  pupils  in  learning  and  so  am- 
bitious were  they  to  learn,  that  the  preparation  of 
the  lessons  became  a  task  of  considerable  magni- 
tude. In  the  sixteen  years  of  her  life  at  Swatow, 
she  wrote  the  entire  account  of  the  Nazarine,  His 
personal  life  and  His  teachings,  according  to  the 
synoptic  Gospels,  and  many  papers  touching  on 
the  world-wide  significance  of  His  mission  on  earth. 
At  first  these  were  printed  separately  on  the  lesson 
leaves  convenient  for  teaching,  but  eventually  the 
several  parts  were  assembled  and  issued  as  a  bound 
book.  She  also  wrote  in  Chinese  many  sermons, 
treatises  and  theses  on  the  philosophy  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion  for  general  distribution  and  use  in  the 
training  school;  several  of  which,  at  least,  are  still 
being  used  in  the  Orient.  In  a  note  contained  in 
one  of  her  scrapbooks,  she  writes  of  two  of  her  for- 
mer lesson  leaves : 

Page   One   Hundred   Twenty-Four 


Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature 

"Soon  after  I  arrived  in  Swatow,  February  2nd, 
1873,  I  composed  and  had  printed  two  leaflets, 
'The  True  God*  and  'After  Death,'  both  of  which 
were  in  constant  and  practical  use  by  the  Baptists 
and  English  Presbyterians  during  all  the  years  of 
my  stay  in  China.  Mrs.  Alexander  Lyall,  my  old 
colleague  (Miss  Sophie  Norwood),  wrote  me  in 
1914  that  these  leaflets  of  mine  were  still  in  use. 
She  said,  'A  great  many  of  them  are  being  used, 
both  those  printed  from  native  blocks,  like  these  en- 
closed, and  from  movable  types,  also.' 

"To  have  provided  two  tracts  to  be  used  in  two 
missions  for  over  forty  years  is  a  good  work  done. 
Such  experiences  as  that  of  knowing  how  long  my 
work  has  continued  to  be  useful  is  among  the  dur- 
able satisfactions  of  life.  Now,  as  I  am  almost 
seventy-six  years  old,  echoes  of  words  spoken  de- 
cades ago  come  to  me  with  frequency.  Tokens 
that  I  have  labored  not  in  vain  cheer  me  as  I  ap- 
proach the  end  of  labor." 

On  the  succeeding  page  is  a  reproduction  of 
"The  True  God,"  a  translation  of  which  is  con- 
tributed hereto  by  Reverend  William  K.  McKibben 
of  Seattle,  who  was  Miss  Fielde's  next  door  neigh- 
bor in  Swatow. 


Page   One  Hundred   Twenty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 


"The  True  God"  in  Chinese 

Page   One   Hundred   Twenty-Six 


Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature 

Translation  "The  True  God" 

44 Above  the  earth  there  is  one  true  God,  His  name 
is  Jehovah,  existing  of  old,  existing  now,  existing 
always.  He  is  without  beginning  and  without  end- 
ing. When  there  was  not  yet  heaven  and  earth, 
nor  land  and  sea,  nor  men  nor  things,  before  these 
things,  this  God  existed.  He  is  always  present, 
everywhere  present,  knows  all  things,  can  do  all 
things,  rules  all  things.  In  the  heavens,  the  sun, 
the  gentle  moon,  the  starry  constellations,  He  made 
them  each  and  all.  On  earth,  the  mountains  and 
seas,  the  streams  and  rivers,  He  likewise  made.  The 
animals  and  wild  creatures  on  the  mountains,  the 
hshes  and  everything  in  the  seas,  He  likewise  made. 
The  grass  and  trees,  vegetation,  fruits,  grains,  flax, 
beans,  rice,  wheat,  He  brings  them  forth  and  gives 
them  to  man  for  food.  All  things  on  earth,  no 
matter  what  they  are,  He  made  them  all. 

**He  is  Lord  of  heaven,  earth,  men  and  all  things. 
Heaven  is  His  throne,  earth  His  footstool.  All 
that  is  in  the  heavens  is  under  His  government.  He 
puts  forth  the  sun,  lifts  the  wind,  sends  down  the 
rain,  resounds  the  thunder,  drops  the  dew. 

"Of  all  men  on  earth  He  is  the  original  ancestor. 
He  is  the  fountain-head  of  life.  Man's  life,  man's 
death,  are  as  His  will.  He  knows  man's  doings. 
He  sees  man  always,  whether  by  day  or  by  night. 
What  he  does  in  the  darkness,  God  knows.  If  a 
man  does  right,  He  loves  him,  protects  him,  rewards 
him.  And  if  a  man  commits  wickedness  He  pun- 

One  Hundred   Twenty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

iskes  him  with  penalties.  In  this  God  all  nations 
of  men  beneath  the  heavens  have  an  equal  share. 
Above  heaven  or  beneath  it  there  is  no  other  God 
to  worship.  This  is  the  TRUE  GOD.  Other  gods, 
the  whole  of  them,  are  false.  If  one  would  worship 
this,  the  True  and  Living  God,  he  need  not  burn  in- 
cense nor  paper,  nor  make  offerings,  nor  go  to  the 
temple  to  worship.  Let  him  with  true  heart  and 
true  mind  come  and  serve  Him,  follow  His  com- 
mands, hearken  to  His  law,  flee  the  evil  and  follow 
the  good. 

"This,  the  One  Living  God,  sent  to  this  earth  a 
Savior  of  the  World  to  redeem  men  from  their  sins 
and  save  men's  souls.  Believe  and  trust  in  Him; 
thus  you  can  reach  the:  Heavenly  Temple." 

1  'After  Death"  Translation  by  Rev.  Wm.  K.  McKibben 

"After  a  man  dies,  there  are  two  places  to  go. 
One  is  a  place  of  misery,  the  other  a  place  of 
comfort.  The  place  of  misery  is  called  Hell;  the 
place  of  comfort  is  called  the  Heavenly  Temple. 
In  Hell  all  is  darkness.  Those  who  enter  there 
are  ceaselessly  burned  with  fire,  ceaselessly 
gnawed  by  worms,  and  live  among  sorrows  and 
wicked  men.  One  enters  there  and  it  is  impossi- 
ble to  come  out  again. 

"If  a  man  believes  in  the  Gospel  teaching  and 
follows  the  precepts  of  the  Savior  then  after 
death  he  reaches  the  Heavenly  Temple.  There 
everyone  is  happy,  joyous.  The  streets  there  are 

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Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature 

of  gold,  the  houses  of  jade,  forever  imperishable. 
The  people  there  are  clad  in  white  garments,  for- 
ever clean.  In  that  country,  it  is  neither  cold  nor 
hot.  There  are  no  insect  pests.  There  is  no  dark- 
ness for  it  is  forever  light,  the  people  there 
are  neither  scorched  by  the  sun  nor  drenched  with 
rain.  They  do  not  get  sick.  They  do  not  die. 
There  is  no  suffering,  no  sorrow,  no  shedding  of 
tears.  There  is  neither  thirst  nor  hunger  nor 
poverty.  When  they  reach  that  place,  those  that 
are  blind,  their  eyes  are  open;  those  that  are  deaf, 
can  hear.  The  lame  can  walk  the  streets,  the  dumb 
can  speak.  The  wounded,  their  wounds  are  well; 
the  lepers,  their  leprosy  is  cured.  People  there  do 
not  revile  one  another,  nor  fight,  nor  hate.  All 
love  one  another.  In  peace  and  joy,  they  all  with 
one  heart  and  one  mind,  render  worship  to  the  True 
and  Living  God.  Bad  men  cannot  enter  there.  In 
that  country  the  Savior  is  Emperor,  and  His  Dis- 
ciples dwell  there  with  Him.  When  a  man  reaches 
there  he  is  there  forever.  He  does  not  have  to  come 
back  to  this  world  for  a  rebirth.  Once  reach  the 
Heavenly  Temple  and  there  one  has  happiness 
through  endless  ages. 

"Things  in  this  world  are  for  but  a  few  tens  of 
years.  Things  after  death  are  for  endless  ages. 
While  in  this  world,  endure,  be  patient,  dwell  not 
on  its  troubles.  Believe  in  the  Savior,  learn  His 
ways,  follow  His  rules.  If  after  death  one  can 
but  reach  the  Heavenly  Temple,  then  all  is  well." 

On  another  occasion  she  writes: 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"Swatow,  October  6th,  1874.ff 
"I  went  on  different  days  to  several  of  the  vil- 
lages, where  there  are  Christian  women,  and  in 
all,  had  a  splendid  opportunity  of  speaking  to  the 
villagers.  The  brethren,  who  accompanied  me, 
remained  at  the  door  of  the  house  in  which  I  sat, 
and  spoke  to  the  men,  while  1  and  a  Biblewoman 
talked  to  the  women  inside.  In  one  village  I  was 
asked  to  go  and  sit  in  the  Ancestral  Hall  and  there 
had  a  congregation  of  fifty  women. 

"For  some  months  we  have  been  looking  for  a 
piece  of  land  that  could  be  had  for  building  a 
small  house  for  mission  work  in  the  villages.  We 
fixed  on  one  at  Kue  Suia,  on  the  bank  of  the 
river,  six  miles  from  the  Kit-ie  chapel.  Within  a 
radius  of  three  miles  are  eighty  villages.  A 
Christian  who  lives  there,  and  who  is  the  only 
man  who  has  even  a  few  hundreds  of  dollars  in 
property,  bought  the  piece  of  land  for  forty-five 
dollars  and  presented  it  to  the  church,  as  a  site 
for  the  house.  On  Sunday,  at  communion,  the 
church  members  were  told  of  the  great  use  which 
the  projected  building  would  be  in  spreading  the 
knowledge  of  the  Gospel. 

"After  service  a  member  wrote  down  the  sub- 
scriptions. One  gave  two  stone  posts,  costing 
four  dollars;  another,  the  main  beam  for  the 
roof,  and  the  rest  subscribed  thirteen  dollars.  This, 
in  consideration  of  their  extreme  poverty,  was 
very  liberal.  The  work  of  the  building  is  already 

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commenced  and  will  cost  about  three  hundred 
dollars. 

"When  we  have  excited  the  people  to  do  some- 
thing for  themselves,  we  have  accomplished  far 
greater  good  than  for  anything  done  for  them  by  us. 
The  Chinese  are  entirely  capable  of  being  trained 
for  self-help  and  therefore  eminently  worth  the 
wise  care  of  those  who  have  the  power  to  help  them. 

"Last  Sunday  there  were  sixty  at  the  morning 
service  and  thirty-six  that  partook  of  the  com- 
munion. Two  of  the  brethren  were  under  dis- 
cipline for  having  helped  to  carry  the  appliances 
of  a  theatre  connected  with  idol  worship.  Though 
they  confessed  their  sin,  they  were  required  to 
abstain  from  the  sacrament  for  two  months.  The 
native  pastor,  Hu  Sinsey,  is  doing  valuable  work 
and  there  is  real  growth  in  morality  and  piety." 

On  October  6th,   1875,  she  wrote: 

"Some  of  our  poor  Christian  people  are  being 
persecuted  for  their  Master's  sake.  One  of  the 
Biblewomen  has  been  badly  beaten  at  the  village, 
to  which  she  went  to  work,  and  some  of  the 
women  in  that  vicinity  have  had  to  flee  from 
their  homes,  and  stay  at  the  chapel,  for  some  days, 
to  escape  maltreatment. 

"We  have  so  long  been  taught  to  pity  the 
heathen,  that  those  who  have  had  no  practical  ex- 
perience with  them  forget  how  wicked  and  cruel 
and  adverse  to  all  good  they  are.  They  have  to 
be  saved  by  main  strength.  If  we  worked  for 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

love  of  them,  our  impulse  would  soon  fail.  Work- 
ing for  love  of  Christ,  our  impetus  grows  stronger 
as  we  see  how  hard  His  work  was  and  how  un- 
lovely those  He  loved." 

A  dictionary  of  the  Swatow  dialect,  with  Eng- 
lish equivalents,  was  another  of  Miss  Fielde's  per- 
manent literary  contributions  to  the  Chinese.  It 
was  the  only  dictionary  of  the  Swatow  tongue 
that  has  ever  been  printed;  and,  up  to  the  present, 
it  has  done  full  service  for  thirty  years.  Many 
editions  of  the  work  have  been  reprinted  since 
the  first  appeared  and  many  thousands  of  copies 
are  now  in  circulation.  Its  use  is  not  confined 
exclusively  to  missionary  purposes,  but  English- 
speaking  merchants,  diplomats,  explorers  and 
travelers,  have  found  it  convenient  in  communi- 
cating with  the  Chinese  of  the  Kwangtung  province. 
The  work  is  quite  large  compared  with  other 
Chinese  books  and  it  took  a  year  to  put  it  into 
type.  It  was  printed  in  Shanghai,  where  its 
author  was  obliged  to  remain  the  whole  of  that 
time,  reading  the  proof  and  supervising  the  work. 
In  one  of  her  letters,  Miss  Fielde  writes  that  the 
process  of  printing  was  necessarily  slow,  as  the 
printers  were  not  familiar  with  the  Swatow  dia- 
lect, and  they  did  not  understand  the  meanings 
of  many  of  the  words  they  put  into  type. 

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Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature 

An  English  newspaper  published  at  Shanghai, 
printed  the  following  review  of  this  great  work: 

"There  is  a  sentence  in  the  Chinese  classics  to 
the  effect  that  if  the  virtues  of  the  Superior  man 
are  not  known,  it  is  the  fault  of  his  friends.  There 
is  much  wisdom  in  the  philosopher's  remark,  for 
true  merit,  whether  moral  or  intellectual  is  retir- 
ing, and  does  not  seek  for  fame  or  even  publicity, 
but  rather  avoids  both;  and  hence  it  becomes  one 
of  the  pleasantest  duties  of  an  editor,  when  per- 
sons of  this  character  are  discovered,  to  see  that 
justice  is  done  them.  Had  newspapers  existed  in 
the  days  of  Confucius,  the  worthy  sage  would  no 
doubt  have  given  terse  directions  to  editors  as  to 
their  duties,  so  that  they  might  know  how  to 
repress  and  keep  in  check  the  over-forward,  and 
encourage  and  bring  into  notice  the  more  diffident 
among  their  literary  acquaintances.  But  be  this  as 
it  may,  we  feel  that  we  have  been  neglectful  in  the 
case  of  one  of  the  most  talented  and  at  the  same 
time  one  of  the  most  devoted  and  self-denying  phil- 
anthropists that  ever  came  to  China.  Miss  Fielde 
resided  at  Shanghai  for  about  a  year,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  putting  through  the  press  a  work  which 
does  the  greatest  credit  to  her  literary  abilities  and 
indomitable  perseverance.  Day  after  day,  rain  or 
shine,  hot  or  cold,  sick  or  well,  she  might  have  been 
seen  on  her  way  to  or  from  the  printing  office,  where 
for  the  sake  of  expedition  as  well  as  convenience 
to  the  printers,  she  would  sit  hour  after  hour  at 
the  tedious  task  of  reading  over  and  correcting 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

proofs  which  she  alone  could  read  and  under- 
stand. And  thus  her  elaborate  and  comprehen- 
sive dictionary  of  the  Swatow  dialect,  was  put 
through  the  press  at  a  uniform  rate  of  so  many 
pages  per  day.  It  will  remain  a  lasting  monu- 
ment of  what  a  woman  can  do,  whose  heart  is  in 
a  good  cause,  and  whose  religious  sentiments  are 
backed  up  by  unusual  abilities  and  untiring  zeal 
and  enthusiasm.  But  for  us,  we  will  only  remark 
that  the  people  of  Swatow  are  to  be  envied  the 
possession  of  a  lady  of  such  accomplishments  and 
refinement,  coupled  with  such  sensible  enthusiasm 
and  self-denial  in  the  missionary  cause. 

"The  dictionary  lies  before  us — a  large  volume, 
between  six  and  seven  hundred  quarto  pages  of 
closely  printed  matter.  The  Herculean  task  in- 
volved in  the  preparation  and  publication  of  such 
a  book,  can  hardly  be  conceived  by  anyone  who 
has  never  attempted  it.  We  understand  that  the 
Swatow  dialect  is  spoken  by  only  eight  million 
people,  over  a  region  some  thirty  miles  wide  by 
sixty  miles  long.  The  knowledge  that  the  diction- 
ary could  be  serviceable  for  this  one  particular 
dialect  and  over  such  a  limited  area,  instead  of  be- 
ing available  for  the  whole  Empire,  must,  we 
imagine,  have  made  the  task  feel  all  the  more  weari- 
some. But  we  will  let  the  good  lady  speak  for 
herself,  as  she  does  in  the  preface: 

'The  completion  of  this  Dictionary,  which 
contains  five  thousand  four  hundred  and  forty-two 
words,  has  occupied  four  years,  in  connection  with 

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Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature 

much  other  work.  Thanks  are  due  from  the  author 
to  many  who  have  incidentally  assisted  her  in  the 
making  of  this  book,  especially  to  Dr.  S.  Wells 
Williams,  whose  labors  of  like  nature  have  helped 
her  to  such  knowledge  as  she  has  to  the  Chinese 
language;  to  Dr.  William  Ashmore,  whose  ac- 
quain,tance  with  the  Swatow  vernacular  has  made 
his  advice  valuable  to  her ;  to  those  who  at  different 
times  and  places  have  cared  for  her  during  severe 
illness;  to  those  who  have  furnished  funds  for  the 
publication  of  this  work;  and  to  Dr.  and  Mrs.  M. 
T.  Yates  of  Shanghai,  whose  home  has  been  hers 
during  the  year  of  putting  the  book  through  the 
press/ 

"A  more  modest  and  unpretentious  preface  to  a 
book  involving  such  an  amount  of  scholarship  and 
labor,  we  do  not  ever  remember  to  have  seen.  The 
object  for  which  all  these  pains  have  been  taken  is 
told  in  an  equally  concise  manner  in  the  dedica- 
tion: 

'To  those  who  are  to  come  into  the  American 
Baptist  Mission  at  Swatow,  bearing  the  Gospel  of 
Christ  to  the  Tie  Cheu  people,  this  book  is  affec- 
tionately inscribed.' 

"The  introduction  gives  some  very  interesting 
information  respecting  the  tones  of  the  Swatow 
dialect,  and  there  are  tables  of  exercises  on  the 
tones,  sounds,  aspirates,  nasals,  etc.,  which  must 
prove  of  great  use  to  learners  of  this  strange  and 
apparently  harsh  sounding  language.  Beyond  this 
observation,  we  leave  the  book  to  those  who  are 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

versed  in  the  dialect,  to  determine  its  general  cor- 
rectness, save  that  we  will  express  our  conviction 
that  the  whole  book  will  be  found  a  counterpart 
of  its  author,  and  will  possess  the  thoroughness 
and  conscientious  accuracy  which  characterizes  all 
her  doings.  'Those  who  are  to  come,'  at  Swatow, 
have  surely  great  cause  for  thankfulness  that  there 
is  such  a  help  to  the  knowledge  awaiting  them. 

"We  have  now  done  with  the  Dictionary,  but 
not  quite  with  Miss  Fielde.  Did  our  space  permit, 
we  would  like  to  give  a  comprehensive  sketch  of 
her  life-work  in  China,  of  which  the  book  in  ques- 
tion is  but  a  fraction.  It  is  in  fact,  only  a  small 
part  of  a  scheme  for  extending  missionary  work 
in  China,  the  like  of  which  was  never  yet  dreamed 
of  or  attempted  in  the  Orient — the  training  and  use 
of  Biblewomen  as  evangelists.  Those  of  our 
readers  who  attended  the  Missionary  Conference 
at  Shanghai,  in  1877,  will  remember  the  speech 
she  was  pressed  to  make  on  this  subject,  and  which 
was  allowed  to  have  been  one  of  the  most  able 
made  at  the  gathering.  The  worthy  chairman,  it 
is  true,  opposed  strongly  the  idea  of  a  lady  speak- 
ing in  public,  and  vacated  the  chair  rather  than  give 
his  permission  to  such  an  unscriptural  proceeding, 
but  she  made  the  talk,  notwithstanding.  The  plan 
she  so  ingenuously  described  on  that  occasion  was 
already  in  operation  and  has  now  been  adopted 
and  is  in  use  over  the  whole  of  China  by  every 
Christian  Mission  here. 

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"We  therefore  wish  her  every  success  in  what 
she  has  made  her  work  of  faith  and  love." 

Collaborating  with  Dr.  William  Ashmore,  Sr., 
Miss  Fielde  also  translated  the  Book  of  Genesis  into 
Chinese.  This  was  an  extremely  difficult  task, 
because  of  the  labor  involved  in  improvising  the 
text  so  as  to  adapt  it  to  the  understanding  of  the 
natives.  The  thought  processes  of  the  Mongol  are 
unlike  those  of  any  other  race.  The  mind  of  the 
yellow  man  functions  in  grooves  wholly  unused  by 
the  European  peoples.  Miss  Fielde  was  singularly 
successful  in  learning  to  think  like  the  Chinese.  At 
the  time  she  lived  in  China  there  were  a  number 
of  Europeans  who  were  her  superiors  in  Chinese 
scholarship,  but  she  had  the  reputation  of  excelling 
in  the  interpretation  of  Chinese  thought. 

But  it  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  Miss  Fielde's 
work  consisted  solely  in  writing  tracts,  sermons 
and  Gospel  lessons.  Such  was  not  the  case.  In 
fact  her  literary  compositions  were  largely  super- 
erogatory. She  had  been  appointed  to  teach  Chris- 
tianity to  Chinese  women.  Besides  the  long  tedious 
hours  spent  in  the  training  school,  her  duties  often 
compelled  her  to  visit  missionary  stations  some- 
times remote  from  the  Swatow  compound.  Often 
she  was  detailed  to  establish  new  stations  in  dis- 
tant localities  where  white  people  had  never  be- 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

fore  been  seen  or  even  heard  of.  Many  of  these 
latter  excursions  were  attended  by  danger  from  per- 
stonal  violence,  and  not  unfrequently  she  was 
threatened  with  death  by  the  unfriendly  and  suspi- 
cious natives. 

She  had  three  modes  of  traveling — by  foot, 
horseback  and  by  boat.  The  latter  appears  to  have 
been  her  favorite,  as  the  river  traversed  the  more 
populous  sections  of  the  province,  and  she 
was  provided  with  a  small  boat  which  was  built 
and  fitted  for  journeys  of  several  weeks  duration. 
On  such  occasions  Miss  Fielde  and  her  lady  travel- 
ing companion  lived  aboard  the  boat,  the  house  be- 
ing commodious  enough  to  cook  and  sleep  in. 
Under  date  of  December  6th,  1 880,  she  wrote  the 
f ollowing  letter,  descriptive  of  one  of  these  trips : 

'*!  am  homeward  bound  from  Peh  Yah,  sixty 
miles  west  from  Swatow,  where  I  have  spent  three 
pleasant  days.  On  my  arrival  there  I  found  a 
deputation  of  Hakka  people  waiting  to  invite  me 
to  visit  their  village,  five  miles  distant.  They  had 
already  hired  a  sedan  chair  for  me  to  go  in,  and  I, 
with  a  company  of  the  Peh  Yah  members,  ac- 
companied them. 

"Hakka  homes  are  in  a  lonely  and  isolated 
cluster  of  five  hamlets,  environed  by  rice-fields  and 
sweet-potato  patches,  with  high,  bare  mountains 
towering  in  the  distance.  The  dwellings  of  sun- 

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dried  bricks,  made  from  the  mud  of  the  rice-fields; 
walls  without  plaster,  and  no  other  floor  than  the 
earth,  made  level  and  hard  with  pounding.  Earthen 
tiles  are  laid  on  the  roof  like  shingles,  but  so 
loosely  that  they  clatter  in  the  wind.  As  it  is  six 
miles  from  any  stream,  on  which  boats  run,  they 
have  no  lime  except  that  carried  on  men's 
shoulders,  and  only  the  rich  can  afford  a  firmer 
cement  than  mud. 

"With  all  the  appearances  of  poverty,  they  are 
not  very  poor.  They  have  shelter,  food  and 
clothing,  the  products  of  their  own  labor,  as  good 
as  any  that  they  have  seen,  therefore  they  are  not 
conscious  of  want.  Every  man  is  a  tiller  of  the 
soil,  and  there  are  few  who  do  not  own  a  little 
land.  All  of  the  men  know  how  to  read;  none  of 
the  women  bind  their  feet.  They  have  no  idols  or 
fetishes  in  their  houses  and  have  fewer  supersti- 
tions than  other  Chinese.  They  belong  to  a  great 
tribe  that  has  been  for  generations  slowly,  con- 
stantly and  surely,  extending  its  borders  and  pos- 
sessing itself  of  the  land. 

"This  cluster  of  hamlets  has  a  population  of  three 
thousand.  One  of  the  hamlets  consists  of  forty 
families,  of  which  thirty-five  say  they  have  decided 
to  become  Christians.  This  is  the  childhood  home 
of  Mue,  the  only  one  of  our  Biblewomen  whose 
native  tongue  is  Hakka.  In  paying  visits  to  her  own 
mother,  Mue  has  proclaimed  the  Gospel  as  she  had 
the  opportunity,  but  apparently  without  marked 
effect  upon  her  hearers. 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"They  propose  to  build  a  chapel  entirely  at  their 
own  expense,  if  teachers  can  be  sent  them  from 
Swatow.  As  some  of  them  understand  the  Swatow 
dialect,  more  or  less,  and  as  we  have  no  teachers 
that  can  speak  to  them  in  their  own  tongue,  I  pro- 
posed that  they  select  a  half  dozen  of  their  own 
number,  upright  men  and  good  scholars,  to  come 
out  to  Swatow  and  study  in  Dr.  Ashmore's  class 
until  they  should  be  able  to  teach  their  own  people 
'the  true  doctrine.'  Meanwhile  I  called  Sister  Mue 
from  a  neighborhood  station  and  left  her  to  'hold 
the  fort,'  and  instruct  the  women.  I  am  to  imme- 
diately send  in  tracts  and  books  for  the  men.  The 
women,  poor  souls,  cannot  read. 

"When  we  see  *an  open  door,'  in  this  country, 
we  are  always  sure  that  it  is  set  before  us  by  the 
Lord.  The  'childlike  and  bland'  Asiatics  hold  mo- 
tives in  their  minds  in  layers,  many  as  the  super- 
imposed villages  buried  in  Vesuvius.  Under  the 
evident  one  there  is  another  concealed,  and  still 
deeper  ones  may  be  unearthed  by  sufficient  delving. 
If,  when  we  come  to  the  bottom  fact,  we  find  Hakka 
villagers  have  no  less  blessed  motive  underlying 
their  desire  to  learn  saving  truth,  then  the  turn- 
ing of  a  whole  village  to  the  Lord  will  be  a  move- 
ment unseen  in  this  field  and  great  things  are  to 
follow." 

"Swatow,  March  7th,  1881. 

"Yesterday  morning,  Miss  Norwood  and  I  went 
in  our  punt  to  some  villages  three  miles  away  on 
the  coast  seaward.  On  the  outskirts  of  the  first 

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Contributions  to  Chinese  Literature 

village,  I  saw  an  old  woman  gathering  herbs,  and  at 
the  same  time  Miss  Norwood  saw  one  spinning;  so 
we  separated,  and  each  went  to  her  old  woman. 
Mine  said  she  was  gathering  herbs  to  make  a  wash 
for  her  daughter-in-law's  sore  eyes,  and  asked  if 
I  had  an  eye  medicine  that  would  cure  the  blind. 
I  told  her  that  if  she  wished  me  to  do  so,  I  would 
go  with  her  to  her  house  and  there  tell  her  what 
medicine  I  had.  So  she  led  the  way  to  her  home — 
a  new  and  almost  clean  white  hut — in  the  midst 
of  many  brown  and  ill-smelling  ones.  Her  neigh- 
bors saw  us  going  in  and  fifteen  women,  most  of 
them  with  small,  dirty  children  in  their  arms, 
crowded  in  to  inquire  what  remedy  I  could  offer 
for  their  varied  ills.  I  talked  with  them  for  an  hour 
about  the  one  country  in  all  the  universe  that  is 
known  to  be  one  in  which  there  are  no  ills,  and 
what  a  very  little  way  it  is  for  those  who  wish 
to  go,  and  how  blessed  is  the  road  to  that  land 
of  health  and  life.  They  seemed  to  be  deeply  in- 
terested; and  the  daughter-in-law,  who  has  a  dis- 
ease of  the  eyes  which  will  probably  end  in  total 
and  incurable  blindness,  said  she  would  hereafter 
pray  daily  to  the  new  old  God,  Jehovah. 

"I  found  Miss  Norwood,  not  far  off,  reading  the 
tract  'After  Death,'  in  a  little  courtyard,  to  a  group 
of  women  and  children.  I  sat  down  among  the 
hearers.  A  boy,  just  as  high  as  my  shoulder,  kept 
rubbing  his  frowsy  head  upon  me  on  one  side,  and 
a  smaller  boy  tried  to  project  his  begrimed  little 
face  under  my  other  arm  in  an  effort  to  see  the 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

reader;  while  an  old  woman,  a  leper  from  head  to 
foot,  stood  in  front  of  me,  asserting  that  I  had 
grown  old  very  fast  since  she  last  saw  me.  She 
endeavored  to  clasp  my  hands  and  I  was  therefore 
very  glad  when  Miss  Norwood  invited  me  to  take 
her  place  and  speak  to  the  group. 

"Afterwards  we  returned  to  our  boat  for  lunch- 
eon, and  then  went  to  another  village.  Passing  a 
house,  at  whose  door  a  woman  sat,  making  sweet- 
potato  flour,  we  told  her  that  we  had  something 
pleasant  to  say  to  her,  if  she  would  give  us  a  seat 
inside  and  keep  all  the  men  and  children  out,  while 
she  let  all  the  women  come  in.  She  at  once  assent- 
ed and  we  stationed  two  of  our  boatmen  at  the 
door,  to  carry  out  the  arrangement.  We  find  this 
is  the  only  way  we  can  get  quiet  congregations. 
The  children  swarm  like  locusts;  and  unless  they 
are  firmly  excluded,  they  take  up  the  room  and 
make  teaching  difficult  by  their  noise  and  squab- 
bling. When  the  women  see  that  the  national 
notions  of  propriety  are  adhered  to,  and  that  no 
men  are  admitted  to  our  presence,  they  come 
pouring  in  from  their  doorways  around  and  we  have 
those  hearers  who  most  need  us  and  whom  we 
can  most  effectually  help.  So  it  was  in  this  house. 

"One  old  womaij  listened  with  a  peculiar  earn- 
estness, and  several  times  asked  me  to  repeat  a 
sentence  that  she  might  be  able  to  remember  it 
after  I  was  gone.  When  our  session  was  broken  up 
by  the  men-folks  coming  in  with  farm  produce, 
which  they  wanted  to  store  away,  this  old  woman 

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hobbled  off  homeward,  and  I  heard  her  saying  as 
she  went,  as  if  to  fix  them  firmly  in  her  memory, 
the  words,  *  Jesus  the  Lord!'  She  had  never  heard 
the  Gospel  before,  perhaps  she  never  will  hear  it 
again.  But  it  may  be,  that  when  she  is  about 
to  cross  over  into  the  next  world,  she  will  there  on 
the  border  of  the  vast,  dark  unknown,  recall  what 
she  yesterday  learned,  and  will  cry  out,  'Jesus  the 
Lord,'  and  that  Jesus  the  Lord  will  hear  His  name 
thus  called,  and  will  come  and  take  her  into  His 
heaven.  There  was  a  woman  once  who,  in  the 
midst  of  a  great  throng,  crowding  after  Him,  just 
touched  the  hem  of  His  garment  and  He  turned 
around  and  sought  her  out  and  saved  her.  I  think 
this  old  woman  will  call  to  Him,  and  He  never 
yet  failed  to  respond  to  His  name." 


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CHAPTER  TWELVE 

Return  to  America;  Preparing  for  Greater  Useful- 
ness; More  Lectures 

IN    1883    Miss   Fielde   returned   to    the   United 
States  for  a  vacation.    She  had  spent  ten  years 
in  China  under  stress  of  hard  work,  unpropit- 
ious  climatic  conditions  and  insanitary  surround- 
ings.   At  the  end  of  the  decade  she  was  physically 
exhausted,  in  poor  health  and  on  the  verge  of  nerv- 
ous prostration.      She  was  badly  in  need  of  rest 
and  change  of  environment. 

However,  recuperation  was  not  the  only  thing 
that  prompted  her  to  return  to  the  land  of  her  birth. 
She  had  two  other  purposes  in  view,  either  of 
which  she  regarded  as  of  much  greater  importance 
than  that  of  her  own  health  and  strength.  One  of 
these  was  a  cherished  plan  by  which  she  could  still 
further  increase  her  power  to  respond  to  the  divine 
command  to  "Go  and  teach/' 

Social  custom  in  China  prohibits  male  physicians, 
native  or  foreign,  from  attending  women  during 
parturition.  No  matter  how  complicated  the  case, 
no  matter  how  intense  the  suffering,  not  even  to 
prevent  death,  is  a  man  permitted  to  enter  a  room 
where  a  woman  is  being  delivered  of  a  child.  There 
are  no  native  women  physicians  in  China. 
Childbirth  is  largely  looked  upon  as  an  occasion 

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Return  to  America 

for  superstitious  ceremony,  rites  and  incantations 
rather  than  one  demanding  the  intelligent  practice 
of  obstetrics.  So  it  too  often  happens  that  a  woman 
in  child  labor  is  left  to  surfer  hours  of  excruciating 
agony  while  her  female  relatives  and  neighbors  are 
noisily  petitioning  the  devils,  demons  and  evil  spir- 
its, not  to  help  the  patient,  but  to  refrain  from  tak- 
ing advantage  of  her  helplessness  to  do  her  some 
malicious  harm. 

Many  of  the  Christian  missions  in  the  Orient 
maintain  lying-in  hospitals  and  employed  physicians 
as  regular  features  of  their  Christian  propaganda, 
but  to  extend  this  branch  of  the  service  so  as  to 
reach  the  five  hundred  million  population  of  China 
presented  problems  of  expense  and  labor  beyond 
the  power  of  Christendom  to  solve.  It  was  always 
Miss  Fielde's  idea  to  educate  the  heathen  to  help 
themselves  materially  as  well  as  spiritually,  so  it 
was  her  plan  to  make  the  study  of  obstetrics  a  part 
of  the  curricula  of  her  training  school  for  Bible- 
women.  To  do  this  she  must  first  prepare  herself 
to  teach.  While  on  her  vacation  she  intended  to 
take  a  special  course  of  study  and  training  in  ob- 
stetrics in  some  medical  institution;  which  plan 
she  successfully  carried  out. 

The  second  cause  of  her  eagerness  to  visit  the 
United  States  was  a  desire  to  investigate  the  then 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

newly  enunciated  doctrine  of  organic  evolution. 
Like  all  other  earnest-minded  people,  Miss  Fielde 
regarded  a  knowledge  of  the  origin,  purpose  and 
destiny  of  humankind  a  matter  of  paramount  im- 
portance. Only  recently  she  had  translated  the 
Book  of  Genesis  into  Chinese.  This  work  had 
caused  her  to  make  a  closer  analysis  of  the  Biblical 
story  of  creation  than  she  had  ever  before  given  it. 
It  also  induced  some  wavering  doubts  on  her  part 
regarding  its  truth.  To  use  hpr  own  words,  her 
strongest  impulsion  was  a  desire  to  know  the 
truth  even  if  its  disclosure  would  cause  her  to  aban- 
don every  preconceived  idea  and  ideal  of  her  entire 
life. 

Charles  Darwin  had  published  his  "Origin  of  the 
Species"  in  1859.  At  first  the  great  work  was 
ridiculed  by  the  ordinary  reader,  discredited  by 
many  of  the  leading  scientists  of  that  day  and  thor- 
oughly reprobated  by  nearly  every  denomination 
of  the  Christian  church.  But  still  the  truths  of  its 
principles  persisted,  and,  in  the  course  of  a  quarter 
of  a  century,  it  had  advanced  from  the  condition 
of  a  fantastic  theory  to  that  of  a  scientific  hypo- 
thesis. When  Miss  Fielde  first  heard  of  it  it  was 
beginning  to  be  acepted  by  the  more  advanced 
thinkers  of  the  scientific  world.  She  was  greatly 
impressed  with  the  idea  from  the  start,  even  though 

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presented  through  devious  and  unfriendly  chan- 
nels. 

It  was  her  purpose  to  avail  herself  of  a  part  of 
the  time  dedicated  to  her  vacation,  to  thoroughly 
inform  herself  of  the  truth  or  falsity  of  Mr.  Dar- 
win's teachings.  If  human  beings  were  the  result 
of  the  applied  principles  of  evolution,  she  wanted 
to  know  it,  even  if  the  beautiful  story  of  Adam  and 
Eve  must  be  relegated  to  the  realms  of  fairyland  as 
a  consequence. 

Before  leaving  China,  she  planned  to  go  without 
delay  and  visit  her  parents  in  western  New  York, 
where  she  proposed  to  take  a  much  needed  rest. 
But  she  was  not  permitted  to  carry  out  this  latter 
part  of  the  program.  Her  fame  as  a  mission  worker 
had  preceded  her.  The  Christian  people  of  her  na- 
tive land  were  eager  to  see  her  and  hear  the  wonder- 
ful story  from  her  own  lips.  Scarcely  had  she  landed 
on  the  western  shore  when  she  was  plunged  into 
a  series  of  missionary  meetings  that  compelled  her 
to  visit  nearly  every  large  city  in  the  United  States. 
Within  a  year  of  her  homecoming  she  had  ad- 
dressed one  hundred  and  fifty  large  assemblages; 
describing  the  peculiarities  of  the  Chinese,  relating 
her  personal  experiences  with  them  and  reciting  sta- 
tistics and  telling  anecdotes  to  illustrate  the  prog- 
ress of  Christianity  in  the  Far  East. 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

In  reporting  one  of  her  talks,  a  Cincinnati  daily 
newspaper  of  November,  1884,  contains  the  fol- 
lowing : 

"A  large  and  enthusiastic  meeting  was  held  yes- 
terday afternoon  at  the  Ninth  Street  church,  to  meet 
Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde,  lady  missionary  in  Swatow, 
Southern  China,  who  is  making  a  tour  of  her  native 
land  in  the  interest  of  the  millions  of  women  of 
China  who  can  only  be  reached  by  Christian  wom- 
en of  Gospel  lands.  Miss  Fielde  received  the  most 
cordial  welcome  from  the  united  churches  of  the 
Baptist  denomination,  not  the  least  token  being 
the  abundance  of  exquisite  flowers  and  the  grace 
of  vine  and  foliage  that  transformed  the  spacious 
prayer  room  to  a  thing  of  brightness  and  beauty. 

"Miss  Fielde  has  a  fine  presence  and  the  appear- 
ance of  one  in  excellent  physical  preservation,  and 
proved  herself  a  speaker  of  no  ordinary  ability, 
impressing  her  hearers  as  eminently  fitted  for  the 
great  work  she  has  undertaken,  evincing  the  utmost 
self-possession,  sound  judgment  and  an  abundance 
of  common  sense  throughout  a  lengthy  address 
bearing  upon  her  recent  labors.  She  said  that  if 
all  the  women  of  China  were  divided  among  the 
lady  missionaries  there  would  be  over  a  million 
to  each  missionary,  and  as  many  men  to  each  male 
missionary.  There  are  less  than  three  hundred  mis- 
sionaries including  all  evangelical  denominations 
in  China.  The  women  are  by  far  the  most  in  need 
of  help  because  of  their  exclusiveness,  their  ignor- 
ance and  deep-rooted  superstitions.  In  selecting 

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ladies  to  go  as  guardians  and  teachers  of  these 
classes,  it  was  stated,  that  the  prominent  requisites 
were  sound  physical  health,  the  ability  to  perform 
the  work  of  both  a  woman  and  a  man,  a  cheerful 
spirit,  the  utmost  self-possession  and,  above  all,  a 
profound  conviction  of  the  value  and  truth  of  Chris- 
tianity. Instances  were  related  of  the  power  of  the 
Gospel  to  lead  Chinese  mothers  to  renounce  the 
worship  of  idols  and  to  cease  the  practice  of  infan- 
ticide. 

'The  first  question  that  comes  to  a  girl  born  in 
that  country,  she  said,  is  whether  she  will  be  allow- 
ed to  live  at  all.  Very  many  girls  are  murdered  by 
their  mothers  as  not  worth  keeping,  and  she  told  of 
the  numbers  killed  by  women  under  her  own  ob- 
servation, giving  details  of  the  cruelties  practiced. 
Many  superstitions  of  the  Chinese  regarding  their 
children  were  related,  and  she  then  told  of  the  pro- 
cess which  girls  who  arrive  at  the  age  of  six  years 
undergo  in  the  course  of  foot-binding.  If  there 
were  no  other  ends  to  be  attained,  the  relieving  of 
the  vast  number  of  suffering  women  from  physical 
pain  would  be  ample  reason  for  sending  missionar- 
ies there.  The  next  horror  that  awaits  the  Chinese 
girl  is  the  marriage  according  to  the  Chinese  cus- 
tom, often  being  forced  to  wed  men  who  were  cruel 
and  worthless.  Suicides  were  unusually  common 
among  Chinese  brides.  After  marriage  the  Chin- 
ese wife  is  ever  unhappy.  No  women  there  could 
conceive  that  a  husband  could  exist  who  did  not 
sometimes  beat  his  wife.  Christianity  remedied 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

these  social  customs.  The  woman  in  heathendom 
has  not  an  equal  chance  in  law,  punishments  were 
always  more  severe  than  those  inflicted  on  men. 
No  hereafter  was  pictured  for  the  wife  of  a  China- 
man save  one  of  gloom  and  darkness.  So  great 
were  the  number  of  women  in  this  hopeless  condi- 
tion that  only  thousands  of  women  missionaries 
would  be  available  to  help  them.  The  greater  ig- 
norance of  the  women,  when  compared  with  the 
men,  increased  the  need  of  personal  work.  Their 
deep  superstition,  as  witnessed  by  their  strange 
fetish  worship  and  devotion  to  idols  and  their  de- 
pendence on  soothsayers  and  fortune  tellers,  in- 
creased the  need  for  Christian  service.  The  unjust 
and  cruel  conditions  under  which  the  laws  and  cus- 
toms placed  women  rendered  their  state  yet  more 
deplorable.  The  laws  concerning  marriage  and  di- 
vorce were  cited  in  illustration,  a  most  pitiful  pic- 
ture, drawn  from  personal  knowledge,  being  given 
of  their  sad  workings.  Christianity  brings  to  the 
dreary,  cheerless  homes  of  these  women  a  comfort 
and  balm.  In  no  way  could  Christian  women  ef- 
fect more  good  in  China  than  in  working  directly 
for  its  adult  heathen  women,  thus  rectifying  the 
family  relations  at  the  spring  and  bringing  light  into 
the  home.  The  work,  however,  was  of  such  magni- 
tude that  it  was  idle  to  expect  a  sufficiency  of  work- 
ers except  through  the  training  of  efficient  native 
helpers. 

"Miss  Fielde  then  gave  a  most  interesting  ac- 
count of  her  training  school  for  the  native  Bible- 

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Return  to  America 

women  of  Swatow,  relating  the  difficulties  attend- 
ing the  establishment  of  the  enterprise,  the  meth- 
ods of  instruction  pursued  and  the  good  work  al- 
ready performed.  During  the  past  eleven  years 
she  had  instructed  eight  hundred  women,  each  of 
whom  had  subsequently  gone  out  to  repeat  in  her 
simple  but  effective  way  the  old  story  of  the  Gos- 
pel. Some  of  them  had  acquired  great  power  in  at- 
tracting and  enchaining  the  attention  of  the  people. 
She  had  never  known  but  two  persons  who  were 
able  to  hold  an  audience  in  tense  interest  for  more 
than  three  hours.  One  was  Joseph  Cook  of  Bos- 
ton, with  his  affluent  stores  of  learning  drawn  from 
all  sources,  the  other  a  poor  Biblewoman  of  Swa- 
tow, with  nothing  but  her  knowledge  of  the  sacred 
Scriptures. 

*'Miss  Fielde  expects  to  go  back  to  Swatow  in 
September,  next  year.  As  a  speaker  she  pleased  the 
audience  greatly  last  evening  and  many  expressions 
of  gratification  and  faith  in  her  work  were  heard  at 
the  close  of  the  exercises." 

Miss  Fielde  incorporated  an  account  of  the  prac- 
tice of  spiritism  by  Chinese  women  in  her  lectures 
on  the  Orient,  which  is  interesting  because  of  the 
similarity  of  these  performances  to  the  seances  of 
the  spiritualist  mediums  of  Europe  and  America. 
Her  description  of  the  meetings  at  which  alleged 
communion  with  disembodied  spirits  is  held  is  here 
reproduced  from  a  report  first  appearing  in  the 
Public  Ledger  of  Philadelphia  in  1884: 

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Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"In  the  eight  month  of  each  succeeding  year  the 
women  of  Swatow  meet  privately  and  fall  into 
trances.  Nearly  all  the  native  women  are  interest- 
ed in  these  secret  sessions  but  many  are  prevented 
from  being  present  by  necessary  occupations  else- 
where, or  from  fear  of  rebuke  from  the  men  of  their 
households.  These  conclaves  are  conducted  by 
women  alone  and  are  regarded  by  men  with  great 
disfavor.  From  three  to  a  dozen  or  more  women 
gather  around  a  table  in  the  center  of  a  room  where 
they  can  be  secure  from  interruption.  Incense 
sticks,  spirit  money  and  bamboo  roots,  bought  by 
previous  contributions  of  farthings,  are  distributed 
among  all  present.  A  fetish  of  some  sort,  a  decayed 
splint  hat,  an  old  broom,  a  chopstick,  or  possibly 
some  more  uncleanly  object,  taken  from  a  rubbish 
heap,  is  brought  in  and  spirit  money  is  burned  be- 
fore it  with  obeisances.  Then  those  who  desire 
to  fall  into  trance  sit  down  at  the  table,  throw  a 
black  cloth  over  their  heads,  hold  a  sheet  of  spirit 
money  and  a  lighted  incense  stick  between  the 
palms  before  their  faces,  shut  their  eyes  and  remain 
motionless  and  silent.  Of  the  other  women,  some 
light  incense  sticks  and  whirl  them  over  the  heads 
of  the  sitters ;  some  rap  constantly,  gently  and  rap- 
idly, with  bamboo  roots  on  the  edge  of  the  table; 
some  chant  invocations,  petitioning  the  gods  to  ad- 
mit these  their  children  to  their  abode.  Many  and 
diverse  incantations  are  iterated.  Two  or  three  of 
the  women,  perhaps,  fall  into  trance.  Their  doing 
so  is  indicated  by  their  trembling  violently,  drop- 
page  One  Hundred  Fifty-Two 


Return  to  America 

ping  the  incense  sticks  they  were  holding,  begin- 
ning to  beat  the  table  with  the  palms  of  their  hands 
and  to  discourse  incoherently.  They  speak  of  meet- 
ing their  own  lost  friends,  or  those  of  other  women 
who  are  present.  They  weep  bitterly  while  they 
appear  to  be  conversing  with  the  dead.  They  de- 
scribe streets,  shops  and  houses,  and  say  that  cer- 
tain persons  are  engaged  in  agriculture  or  trade. 
Sometimes  they,  by  request,  make  inquiry  concern- 
ing the  whereabouts  of  a  dead  person,  and  then  give 
the  information  that  he  has  been  born  into  the  hu- 
man family  for  the  second  time.  Sometimes  they 
report  that  a  dead  neighbor  is  shut  up  in  Hades  with 
nothing  to  eat  but  the  salted  flesh  of  the  infant 
daughters  she  destroyed  when  she  was  alive. 

"As  no  pecuniary  benefit  accrues,  directly  or  in- 
directly, to  the  actors  in  these  scenes,  there  is  less 
reason  for  suspecting  conscious  deception  than  in 
the  case  of  the  public  interpreters  of  the  gods. 
Through  the  whole,  however,  there  is  an  indication 
that  the  minds  of  the  women  are,  during  these 
trances,  moving  in  customary  grooves.  They  evi- 
dently see  what  they  expect  to  see.  They  bring< 
back  no  ideas  save  those  which  they  took  with  them 
when  starting  on  their  quest,  and  this  leads  one  to 
doubt,  in  spite  of  their  disheveled  hair,  pallor  and 
exhaustion,  whether  they  have,  after  all,  really  been 
away  from  home/* 


Page  One  Hundred  Fifty-Three 


CHAPTER  THIRTEEN 

Studying  Medicine;   Investigating  Organic  Evolu- 
tion; Creating  a  College 

DURING  the  spring  and  summer  months  of 
1 883  Miss  Fielde  was  busy  with  her  lecture 
engagements.  She  gave  the  time  to  this 
purpose  somewhat  reluctantly,  as  she  had  formed 
a  different  program  for  spending  her  vacation.  At 
the  end  of  the  first  five  months  of  her  return,  she 
found  that  the  demand  for  her  services  as  a  church 
entertainer  was  increasing  rather  than  diminishing, 
so  she  instructed  her  managers  to  decline  all  invi- 
tations that  required  her  presence  after  September. 
Late  in  September  she  matriculated  at  the  Wom- 
an's Medical  College  of  Philadelphia  for  a  course  in 
obstetrics.  At  that  period  of  our  industrial  devel- 
opment women's  sphere  of  usefulness  was  still 
greatly  restricted.  True,  women  were  beginning 
to  enter  the  professional  fields  but  by  only  a  very 
small  percentage  of  their  numbers,  and  the  institu- 
tions of  learning  to  which  they  were  admitted  were 
comparatively  few  and  often  of  inferior  standing. 
The  principle  of  co-education  had  established  a 
firm  foothold  in  the  western  states  but  it  was  far 
from  being  popular  in  the  more  conservative  east. 
One  or  two  of  the  more  liberal  of  the  Philadelphia 
schools  of  medicine  for  men,  however,  permitted 

Page  One  Hundred   Fifty-Four 


Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Evolution 

women  students  to  attend  their  clinics,  yet  the  en- 
couragement offered  was  not  characterized  by  any 
great  degree  of  spontaneity  and  often  the  men  stu- 
dents of  those  institutions  openly  resented  the 
presence  of  women  at  such  assemblies.  Frequent- 
ly the  young  women  were  subjected  to  various 
forms  of  heckling,  such  as  cat  calls,  hen  cackling, 
etc.,  on  the  part  of  the  young  men.  On  one  occa- 
sion Miss  Fielde  was  instrumental  in  putting  an 
end  to  these  annoyances,  at  least  from  one  source, 
and  she  accomplished  her  task  in  such  a  way  that 
she  not  only  won  the  enduring  gratitude  and  affec- 
tion of  the  women  of  the  class  but  the  admiration 
and  future  respect  of  the  offending  men  students. 
A  Philadelphia  newspaper  published  the  following 
unique  account  of  the  incident  at  the  time  of  its 
occurrence : 

"All  the  theoretical  argument  in  the  world  goes 
down  before  one  ounce  of  actual  experience.  While 
the  theorists  and  re-actionists  have  been  proclaim- 
ing that  to  admit  women  into  the  same  institutions 
of  learning  with  men  would  be  absolutely  ruinous 
to  the  character  of  both  men  and  women,  some  in- 
stitutions have  just  gone  on  and  done  it.  Oberlin 
did  this  dreadful  thing  from  its  opening,  as  also 
Antioch  College.  And  now,  in  his  annual  report, 
Professor  Angell  of  the  University  of  Michigan, 
the  largest  university  in  America,  states  that  for 
thirteen  years  women  have  been  admitted  on  the 

Page  One  Hundred  Fifty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

same  terms  with  men,  and  that  nothing  but  good 
has  resulted  from  that  which  has  long  ceased  to  be 
an  experiment. 

"Just  here  we  cannot  deny  ourselves  the  plea- 
sure (the  editor  has  so  few  pleasures)  of  quoting 
from  the  Medical  News  of  this  city  the  following 
account  of  a  beautiful  thing  that  was  done  recently 
by  one  of  the  noblest  of  women : 

'There  are  about  fifteen  students  at  the  Wom- 
an's Medical  College  in  Philadelphia,  fitting  them- 
selves as  medical  missionaries  for  Asia  and  else- 
where. Three  of  them  attended  last  Saturday's  med- 
ical clinic  at  Blockley — the  only  women  among 
one  hundred  and  fifty  young  men.  The  lecturer 
was  late,  and  the  class,  in  their  impatience  and  en- 
forced idleness,  began  some  noisy  demonstration, 
directed,  evidently,  to  the  delinquent  teacher,  but 
later  apparently  intended  for  the  women  present, 
not  so  much  in  way  of  serious  insult  but  of  playful 
banter.  Miss  A.  M.  Fielde,  one  of  the  most  widely 
known  and  eminent  missionaries  in  China,  arose, 
and,  amidst  instant  and  respectful  silence,  said: 
'Gentlemen,  1  have  been  for  eighteen  years  a  mis- 
sionary in  China.  The  Chinese  have  no  medical 
science,  and  superstitious  rites  are  chiefly  relied  on 
in  the  treatment  of  disease.  All  the  people  are  in 
need  of  medical  aid,  but  the  women  are  the  neediest. 
A  Chinese  woman  would  under  no  circumstances 
go  to  a  male  physician  for  the  treatment  of  any  dis- 
ease peculiar  to  her  sex.  She  would  suffer  life-long 
agony  rather  than  violate  her  sense  of  propriety. 

Page  One  Hundred   Fifty-Six 


Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Evolution 

Her  father,  her  brothers,  and  her  husband  would 
even  let  her  die  rather  than  allow  her  to  be  treated 
by  a  male  physician.  Full  of  sorrow  for  the  suffer- 
ings of  these  women,  I  have  been  looking  in  Chris- 
tian America  to  see  what  hope  for  help  for  them 
might  be  here.  I  have  been  glad  to  find  that  in 
some  of  our  great  medical  schools  earnest  and  self- 
sacrificing  women  are  fitting  themselves  for  a  work 
of  mercy  in  Asia  and  other  lands.  Unless  such 
women  learn  to  do  such  work  well,  there  is  no  phy- 
sical salvation  for  those  afflicted  ones.  In  behalf  of 
these  women,  who  have  no  medical  care  while  they 
so  sorely  need  it,  I  ask  from  you  the  courtesy  of 
gentlemen  towards  ladies  who  are  studying  medi- 
cine in  Philadelphia/ 

'The  whole  class  responded  to  her  earnest  ad- 
dress with  a  cheer,  and  one  of  their  number,  rising, 
offered  the  women  a  public  apology.  Evidently  a 
new  aspect  of  the  case  had  been  presented  to  many 
of  them — one  which  claimed  their  respect  and  sym- 
pathy." 

It  will  be  recalled  that  Miss  Fielde  had  proposed 
to  make  a  systematic  investigation  of  the  basic 
principles  of  organic  evolution  during  her  vaca- 
tion. She  had  been  advised  to  apply  to  the  Acad- 
emy of  Natural  Sciences  of  Philadelphia  for  infor- 
mation as  to  how  this  plan  could  be  carried  out. 
Soon  after  she  had  established  herself  at  the  Wom- 
an's College  of  Medicine  she  called  at  the  Academy 
and  made  her  quest  known.  Here  she  was  told 

Page   One   Hundred   Fifty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

that  there  was,  actually,  no  place  in  Philadelphia 
where  she  could  be  instructed  in  the  higher  prin- 
ciples of  biology  and  taught  the  necessary  research 
work  that  would  demonstrate  the  truth  or  falsity 
of  Mr.  Darwin's  theory.  The  Academy,  it  was  ex- 
plained, was  an  institution  of  learning,  but  not  an 
institution  of  teaching.  It  was  fully  equipped  with 
the  facilities  for  the  undertaking  Miss  Fielde  con- 
templated, but  was  not  organized  to  give  the  need- 
ed instruction.  It  was  designed  as  a  place  of  scien- 
tific experiment,  review  and  registry — a  school  of 
application  but  not  one  of  instruction.  Students 
were  welcome  to  the  free  use  of  its  library  of  scien- 
tific books  and  publications,  its  museum  of  natural 
history  specimens  and  its  laboratories  of  apparatus 
and  equipment  for  scientific  experiment  but  there 
was  no  provision  by  which  they  could  receive  per- 
sonal tuition  in  any  branch  or  branches  of  science. 

But  Miss  Fielde  was  not  to  be  defeated  of  her 
purpose.  She  told  her  story  simply,  truthfully  and 
powerfully — as  only  she  could  tell  it.  The  heads 
of  the  academy  were  big  men,  built  on  the  broad 
lines  of  self-effacement  and  devotion  to  useful 
knowledge — as  only  scientists  are  so  made.  She 
saw  in  them  the  source  of  light  by  which  the  great- 
est of  the  three  great  problems  of  the  universe — 
origin,  purpose  and  destiny  of  humankind — could 

Page  One  Hundred  Fifty-Eight 


Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Evolution 

be  made  plain  to  her.  They  saw  in  her  a  possible 
contributor  to  the  brilliancy  of  the  light  they  loved 
so  well.  At  the  conclusion  of  her  visit,  arrange- 
ments had  been  made  by  which  she  was  to  enter 
the  Academy  as  the  only  student  beginner  with  a 
corps  of  the  most  eminent  scientists  of  the  age  as 
her  preceptors. 

Miss  Fielde  was  really,  though  indirectly,  the 
cause  of  the  biological  department  being  added  to 
the  University  of  Pennsylvania.  Under  the  cap- 
tion of  "A  Proposed  Biological  School"  the  Pub- 
lic Ledger  of  February,  1 884,  contains  the  follow- 
ing editorial  in  which  she  is  given  that  credit : 

"It  is  quite  remarkable  that  the  present  lively 
discussion  and  proposal  of  plans  for  a  biological  in- 
stitute or  school  in  Philadelphia  should  have  its  im- 
pulse in  the  inquiry  and  demand  of  a  woman  for 
such  facilities  in  this  city.  Miss  A.  M.  Fielde,  so 
well  known  for  her  work  and  residence  in  China, 
will  be  the  responsible  cause  if  these  plans  are  car- 
ried out.  Just  a  year  ago  Miss  Fielde  came  to  Phila- 
delphia for  facilities  of  study  which  do  not  exist 
here,  in  the  place  she  naturally  regarded  as  the 
scientific  center  of  the  United  States.  The  superb 
collection  of  the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  is 
here;  the  great  biologist  of  the  United  States,  Pro- 
fessor Leidy,  is  here,  in  himself  an  institute  equal 
to  a  library  of  text  books.  Yet  younger  lecturers 
and  specialists,  such  as  Heilprin,  Sharp,  Jayne,  and 

Page   One   Hundred    Fifty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

others,  owe  to  Germany  their  definite  training, 
which  is  gratifying  to  know  is  now  to  be  employed 
in  lecturing  work  at  home.  But  the  lecture  course, 
however  interesting,  does  not  make  a  school.  Some- 
thing more  is  required,  and  we  are  glad  to  learn 
that  plans  are  actively  preparing  which  are  design- 
ed to  crystallize  into  the  School  of  Biology,  which 
may  be  in  any  sort  of  building  or  location,  so  that  it 
establishes  the  Biological  Chair  with  Professor 
Leidy  in  it,  and  is  open  to  pupils  at  some  fairly  early 
day  for  practical  work.  The  laboratory  for  such  a 
school,  as  Professor  Huxley  and  Mrs.  Stevenson, 
of  Chicago,  have  shown  in  their  Science  Primers 
may  be  very  simple  at  the  start ;  the  yeast  plant ;  the 
green  'scum*  on  the  standing  pool;  the  crayfish,  etc. 
What  is  wanted  is  the  brains  under  hat  (or  bonnet) 
to  direct  the  research  and  study,  while  the  school 
makes  its  own  museum;  with  the  splendid  collec- 
tion of  the  Academy,  which  is  open  to  students  for 
reference  and  research.  To  go  back  to  the  opening 
sentence  of  this  notice,  it  does  not  need  to  be  stated 
that  such  a  school  must  be  equally  open  to  both 
young  women  and  young  men,  as  indeed,  the  little 
Aggasiz  Associations,  of  boys  and  girls  both,  are 
preparing  for  it  most  intelligent  and  discriminating 
scholars.  To  have  reached  a  point  where  co-educa- 
tion must  come  in  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  with- 
out which  no  public  support  could  be  asked  for, 
makes  the  proposed  school  an  advance  all  along 
the  line.*' 

A  quarter  of  a  century  after,  Miss  Fielde  wrote 

Page  One  Hundred   Sixty 


Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Evolution 

an  account  of  the  incident  at  the  request  of  Dr.  Ed- 
ward J.  Nolan,  librarian  of  the  Academy  of  Natural 
Sciences  of  Philadelphia.  It  seems  that  Dr.  Nolan 
was  collecting  data  of  events  of  scientific  interest, 
when  he  came  across  the  newspaper  clipping  repro- 
duced in  the  foregoing,  which  he  himself  had  pre- 
served and  probably  forgotten.  He  wrote  Miss 
Fielde  asking  for  her  version  of  the  matter  and  re- 
ceived the  following  answer  from  Seattle: 

"Dear  Dr.  Nolan:— 

"In  December,  1883,  I  first  went  to  Philadelphia 
for  the  purpose  of  studying  biology  there.  I  had 
while  in  China  become  deeply  interested  in  reading 
about  the  theory  of  evolution,  and  had  determined 
to  study  along  lines  that  would  show  me  upon  what 
it  rested.  In  my  journey  across  the  continent,  after 
my  return  to  America,  I  had  met  Dr.  David  Starr 
Jordan,  who  told  me  that  Philadelphia  would  be  the 
best  place  in  which  to  pursue  such  studies.  Having 
then  been  in  Asia  for  some  fifteen  years,  I  was  not 
well  acquainted  with  scientists  in  my  own  country. 
With  letters  of  introduction  to  Dr.  Joseph  Leidy, 
Professor  Edward  Cope,  Dr.  Harrison  Allen,  your- 
self and  others,  I  enquired  from  those  named  how 
and  where  I  should  begin  in  the  work  I  had  in  mind. 

"I  had  just  completed  my  Dictionary  of  the  Swa- 
tow  Dialect  in  Shanghai  and  was  about  to  publish 
my  Pagoda  Shadows  in  Boston,  but  there  was  noth- 
ing that  I  so  much  desired  as  to  acquire  a  knowledge 

Page  One  Hundred  Sixty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

of  biology.  I  was  possessed  of  a  great  intellectual 
hunger.  One  of  the  leading  scientists  of  America 
had  sent  me  to  Philadelphia  to  get  what  I  wanted. 
I  had  come  from  afar  and  I  felt  that  I  must  be  pro- 
vided with  the  means  of  pursuing  my  quest. 

"My  talks  with  these  scientists  caused  them  to 
talk  with  one  another  and  with  other  scientific  men 
about  the  fact  that  a  woman  had  no  place  in  which 
to  study  biology  under  established  instruction  in 
Philadelphia.  Within  a  year  Dr.  Jayne  had  given 
forty  thousand  dollars,  I  think,  for  creating  a  bio- 
logical department  open  to  women  at  the  Univer- 
sity of  Pennsylvania  and  the  building  was  complet- 
ed and  opened  before  I  left  America  again  in  Sep- 
tember, 1 885.  I  remember  that  in  the  summer  of 
that  year,  Dr.  Harrison  Allen  asked  me  if  I  knew 
that  I  was  the  originator  of  the  new  Biological  De- 
partment. 

"I  did  not  go  to  the  University  after  it  was  creat- 
ed because  I  had  on  my  first  visit  to  you  at  the  Acad- 
emy of  Natural  Sciences  received  assurances  that  I 
should  there  have  every  possible  help  in  my  quest 
for  biological  knowledge.  The  library  was  at  my 
service,  a  table  was  placed  in  a  side  room  for  my 
special  use  and  Professor  Angelo  Heilprin  directed 
the  dissections  I  made.  I  studied  and  dissected 
twenty-six  classes  of  animals  from  amoeba  to  mam- 
mals during  the  two  winters  of  my  stay  there,  and 
began  some  original  research  work  on  regeneration 
of  nerve  tissue.  I  was  there  intellectually  equipped 
for  whatever  scientific  work  I  have  since  attempted. 

Page  One  Hundred  Sixty-Two 


Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Evolution 

During  all  the  two  years  I  had  friendly  advice  from 
many  of  the  officers  of  the  Academy  and  most  cour- 
teous help  whenever  I  needed  assistance.  I  got  a 
new  mental  horizon  because  of  my  studies.  I  have 
and  shall  always  hold  the  most  grateful  memory  of 
those  with  whom  I  was  associated  during  my  two 
years  at  the  Academy,  especially  of  yourself,  Pro- 
fessor Heilprin  and  Dr.  Benjamin  Sharp. 

"Later  studies  at  Woods  Hole  (1894-1907) 
would  probably  never  have  been  pursued  had  I  not 
had  that  first  welcome  at  the  Academy  of  Natural 
Sciences  of  Philadelphia.  But  while  I  did  the  work 
I  had  in  view  at  the  Academy,  the  absence  of  any 
established  places  for  it  in  Philadelphia  impelled 
those  who  knew  my  requirements  to  build  the  Bio- 
logical Department  of  the  University/* 

In  one  of  her  carefully-kept  diaries,  Miss  Fielde 
confesses  that  the  two  years'  vacation  she  spent  in 
the  United  States,  from  1883  till  1885,  was  the 
most  delightful  period  of  her  entire  life.  True,  her 
time  was  almost  constantly  taken  up  with  her 
church  lectures,  biological  and  medical  studies,  yet 
she  found  leisure  to  make  and  cultivate  many 
charming  and  profitable  social  friends  and  acquaint- 
ances. Her  reputation  as  an  author,  lecturer  and 
Oriental  scholar  was  the  cause  of  her  being  brought 
in  social  contact  with  a  host  of  kindred  spirits  in 
the  several  larger  cities  of  the  Eastern  states.  In 
Philadelphia  her  name  appears  frequently  in  news- 
Page  One  Hundred  Sixty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

paper  notices  of  that  period  as  a  participant  in  the 
social  activities  of  the  literati,  scientists  and  college 
dignitaries.  She  was  a  delegate  to  the  World  Con- 
gress of  Scientists  held  in  New  York  in  1 885 ;  and 
there  met  many  of  the  most  distinguished  men  and 
women  from  every  civilized  nation  on  earth.  On 
this  occasion  she  delivered  an  address  on  the  con- 
ception and  knowledge  of  science  among  the  Chin- 
ese. Accounts  of  her  talk  were  printed  in  several 
of  the  New  York  and  Philadelphia  newspapers,  ex- 
cerpts from  one  of  which  is  herein  reproduced: 

"Mathematics  and  astronomy  have  been  some- 
what successfully  studied  in  China  during  two  or 
three  thousand  years ;  but  geography,  geology,  bot- 
any, zoology,  human  anatomy,  physiology,  chem- 
istry and  physics  have  been  unknown  in  native  lit- 
erature. Many  dreary  volumes  have  been  written, 
by  Chinese  authors,  upon  plants,  animals  and  eth- 
nology with  curious  myths,  fables  and  superstitions 
set  forth  as  facts.  In  spite  of  the  vast  bulk  of  its 
pseudo-scientific  literature,  no  true  science  can  be 
said  to  have  existed  in  China  until  it  was  introduced 
from  the  West,  by  the  Jesuit  missionaries,  in  the 
fifteenth  century.  Since  that  time,  and  especially 
during  the  last  few  decades,  many  books  of  Euro- 
pean origin  have  been  translated  into  Chinese,  and 
a  goodly  number  of  volumes  of  a  scientific  and  tech- 
nical character  have  been  prepared  by  Protestant 
and  Catholic  missionaries,  and  by  foreigners  in  the 

Page  One  Hundred  Sixty-Four 


Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Evolution 

service  of  the  Chinese  government.  The  number 
of  such  books  became  considerable  but  no  organiz- 
ed system  for  their  sale  or  distribution  throughout 
the  Empire  had  existed  until  1 884,  Mr.  John  Fryer, 
of  Shanghai,  established  as  an  experimental  and 
philanthropic  undertaking,  a  Chinese  'Scienti- 
fic  Book  Depot,'  for  the  purpose  of  facilitat- 
ing the  spread  of  all  useful  literature  in 
the  native  language.  Elementary  books  on  the  vari- 
ous sciences  studied  in  Western  nations  were  offer- 
ed for  sale,  with  works  on  mechanics,  engineering, 
surgery,  therapeutics,  and  translations  of  'Whea- 
ton's  International  Law,'  and  Loomis'  'Differen- 
tial Calculus.'  The  catalogue  contained  over  two 
hundred  scientific  treatises,  translated  or  compiled 
and  published  in  Chinese,  under  foreign  manage- 
ment, with  a  selection  of  about  two  hundred  and 
fifty  of  sound  and  instructive  works  of  native  ori- 
gin. The  price  of  the  books  range  between  two 
cents  and  sixteen.  The  demand  for  Western  learn- 
ing has  been  greatly  augmented  during  the  last  year 
by  a  remarkable  change  in  the  scheme  of  the  com- 
petitive examinations  whereby  successful  candi- 
dates for  literary  degrees  obtain  honors  and  offices. 
In  the  past,  only  a  knowledge  of  the  native  classics, 
with  skill  in  the  use  of  the  native  hieroglyphics  has 
been  required  of  the  scholar.  Now  geography  and 
natural  philosophy  have  been  added  to  the  subjects 
for  examination,  and  this  action  of  the  Government 
has  turned  the  attention  of  students  throughout  the 
Empire  in  a  new  direction.  The  indications  are 

Page  One  Hundred  Sixty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

that  China  is  to  follow  Japan  in  the  path  of  pro- 
gress in  Western  science  and  philosophy,  though  it 
may  be  with  the  slow  step  that  accords  with  the 
magnitude  of  the  nation.*' 

Miss  Fielde  spent  the  first  summer  of  her  vaca- 
tion in  America  at  Annisquam,  in  the  Biological 
Laboratory  of  that  place;  but  for  the  second  sum- 
mer, during  the  extreme  warm  weather,  she  ac- 
cepted an  invitation  to  visit  Doctor  and  Mrs.  Ben- 
jamin Sharp  at  Nantucket.  Here  she  made  many 
new  acquaintances,  chiefly  with  persons  distin- 
guished in  scientific  circles  or  of  charming  social  ac- 
complishments. In  a  letter,  dated  June  18th,  1885, 
she  wrote  to  the  librarian  of  the  Academy  of  Na- 
tural Sciences  describing  the  pleasures  of  this  oc- 
casion : 
"Dear  Dr.  Nolan:— 

"I  am  most  pleasantly  domiciled  with  Mrs. 
Sharp  in  a  house  a  hundred  years  old,  just  in  the 
center,  and  in  the  highest  portion  of  this  compact 
town.  Nearly  all  the  thirty-five  hundred  inhabitants 
on  this  island  live  in  this  part ;  but  it  is  a  village-like 
spot,  with  none  of  its  houses  mounting  over  two 
stories  and  many  of  its  dwellings  and  shops  only  one 
story  in  height.  There  are  ten  good  hotels,  five 
churches,  a  skating-rink  and  a  bank  here.  The  is- 
land is  level  and  sandy  and  is  chiefly  a  common ;  so 
that  one  may  ride  across  country  and  down  to  the 
seashore  in  any  direction.  There  are  little  bits  of 

Page  One  Hundred  Sixty-Six 


Studying  Medicine;  Investigating  Evolution 

loveliness  everywhere;  such  as  I  saw  this  morning 
— a  field  covered  sparsely  with  butter  cups,  white 
daisies  and  red  clover — all  on  tall  stems,  and  danc- 
ing in  the  wind.  It  seemed  in  looking  through  them 
that  I  had  come  upon  a  troop  of  fairies  in  gold  and 
red  and  white,  sporting  on  a  lawn.  There  are  beds 
of  blossoming  flags  around  the  ponds,  and  there  is 
yellow  heath  on  the  moors,  and  gray-green  stunted 
pines  on  the  knolls.  The  monotony  is  really  very 
charming — with  no  land  in  sight  beside  this  jagged 
flat  island. 

4  This  morning  I  went  for  a  drive  across  the  moor 
with  Dr.  Kite ;  then  I  went  wading  along  shore  with 
Dr.  Sharp,  finding  lovely  little  crawling  things; 
and  then  1  went  to  such  sleep  as  is  only  found  in 
cool  sea  air ;  and  then  I  went  to  the  shore  with  Mrs. 
Sharp  to  see  the  sun  set;  and  then  I  went  rowing 
by  moonlight  with  seven  people.  You  know  I  came 
here  to  study. 

"I  should  immensely  like  to  spend  a  whole  sum- 
mer here  with  four  choice  spirits  in  sound  bodies. 
No,  you  need  not  say  'How  dreadful!'  I  am  capable 
of  being  agreeable  through  an  entire  summer;  and 
so  are  you,  though  you  do  not  believe  it.  If  man 
in  his  (and  her)  normal  condition  were,  like  birds, 
fish  and  squirrels,  what  lovely  times  we  could  have, 
without  work  or  worry,  and  with  sunshine,  seashore 
and  science.  With  a  bathing  dress,  some  bread  and 
milk,  a  microscope  and  the  four  kindred  spirits,  one 
would  be  fully  equipped  for  happiness. *' 

Page   One   Hundred   Sixty-Seven 


CHAPTER  FOURTEEN 

Change  of  Religious  Opinion;  Enlarged  Sphere  of 
Activities;  A  Dangerous  Situation 

QEPTEMBER  8th,  1885,  Miss  Fielde  left  Am- 
|^^  erica  to  return  to  Swatow.  In  the  two  years 
of  her  stay  in  the  United  States  she  had  ex- 
perienced changes  that  were  akin  to  regeneration. 
Her  mental  horizon  had  been  greatly  extended,  her 
moral  perceptions  ref ortified  and  her  physical  health 
fully  restored.  Her  chief  satisfaction  in  these 
changes  lay  in  the  fact  that  she  now  felt  better 
equipped  to  fill  a  much  greater  sphere  of  usefulness 
than  ever  before.  While  she  enjoyed  every  mo- 
ment of  her  vacation  she  suffered  no  regrets  when 
it  came  to  an  end.  Her  feelings  were  characteristi- 
cally expressed  in  a  letter  to  Mrs.  W.  A.  Cauldwell, 
when  she  wrote:  "I  simply  feel  compelled  to  re- 
turn to  Swatow,  having  promised  my  beloved 
Chinese  women  that  if  I  were  alive  and  well  I  would 
surely  come  back  to  them.  Flattering  openings  in 
my  own  country  appeared,  but  the  wrinkled  faces 
of  the  dear  women  always  glimmered  in  the  air  be- 
tween me  and  any  turning  that  led  away  from 
them." 

Two  years'  application  to  scientific  study  and  re- 
search wrought  marvelous  changes  in  Miss  Fielde's 
outlook  on  life,  but  the  changes  were  largely  in 

Page  One  Hundred  Sixty-Eight 


Change  of  Religious  Opinion 

matters  of  religious  opinion,  not  at  all  affecting  her 
moral  viewpoint.  She  lifted  the  veil  that  had 
before  limited  her  intellectual  perspective,  thus  en- 
abling her  to  discern  the  hidden  problems  of  the  uni- 
verse in  a  greater  if  not  wholly  different  light.  In  two 
years  she  had  delved  deep  enough  into  biology  to 
read  Darwin's  writings  understandingly  and  she 
knew  that  his  disclosures  in  organic  evolution  were 
true.  Her  own  research  work  justified  in  her  mind 
his  hypothesis  regarding  the  origin  of  the  species; 
but  she  found  no  reason  for  accepting  the  conclu- 
sions of  the  so-called  agnostic  scientists  regarding  the 
origin  of  life.  She  could  not  believe  that  the  vital 
principle  was  the  result  of  some  accidental  chemical 
admixture  but  clung  more  tenaciously  than  ever  to 
the  biogenetic  idea  that  life  is  necessarily  the  product 
of  antecedent  life.  Nor  could  she  believe  that  the 
workings  of  Natural  law  obviated  the  necessity  for 
a  creator.  She  chose  rather  to  look  upon  evolution 
as  God's  method  of  creation,  operating  alike  in  the 
production  of  inorganic  as  well  as  organic  matter. 
Nature's  laws  she  regarded  as  merely  incidental 
properties  of  Nature's  forces  and  she  could  not  con- 
ceive the  forces  of  Nature  as  being  self-existent  and 
without  some  sort  of  responsible  source. 

Her     scientific     investigations     unquestionably 

Page   One  Hundred   Sixty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

caused  a  change  of  belief  on  her  part  regarding  the 
origin  and  destiny  of  mankind,  yet  her  ideas  con- 
cerning its  purpose  remained  the  same.  It  was  her 
thought  that  the  culture  and  conquest  of  nature 
was  man's  mission  on  earth.  Human  selection,  she 
was  wont  to  say,  is  a  process  exactly  opposite  to 
natural  selection.  Animals  and  plants  destroy  one 
another  that  only  the  fittest  may  survive  on  earth; 
while  human  beings  succor,  protect  and  cherish  one 
another  that  the  fittest  may  survive  in  some  higher 
form  of  existence.  One  of  her  favorite  expressions 
was  that  "Consideration  for  others"  is  the  only 
true  culture  and  that  the  only  correct  way  to  meas- 
ure a  person  is  to  appraise  him  in  relation  to  his  cap- 
acity to  consider  others  and  his  willingness  to  sacri- 
fice self  for  the  welfare  of  others.  "Even  in  the  low- 
er forms  of  'life,'  "  she  would  argue,  "the  more  com- 
plex an  organism,  the  greater  its  regard  for  others. 
For  instance,  the  oyster  is  comparatively  low  in  the 
zoological  scale.  It  is  responsive  to  the  first  law  of 
moral  nature  only,  that  of  Self -Preservation.  It 
gives  birth  to  innumerable  progeny,  but  after  being 
thus  delivered  it  has  no  further  regard  for  its  off- 
spring. The  snake,  on  the  other  hand,  is  of  much 
higher  organization.  It  is  not  only  endowed  with 
the  instinct  of  self-preservation  but  has  evolved 
Love-of-Offspring,  the  second  law  of  moral  nature. 

Page  One  Hundred  Seventy 


Change  of  Religious  Opinion 

It  has  a  genuine  affection  for  its  young  and  will 
fight  vigorously  to  protect  them  and  will  even  die 
in  their  defense.  And,  it  is  not  unusual  for  the 
higher  mammals  to  manifest  promptings  of  Con- 
sanguineous-Propinquity, perhaps  the  third  law  of 
moral  nature.  In  fact,  the  more  nearly  an  animal 
approaches  humankind  in  its  stage  of  evolution, 
the  more  extended  and  better  graduated  are  its  con- 
siderations for  others  than  self.  The  affection  of 
many  of  our  domestic  animals  for  their  owners  is 
proverbial.  But  it  is  reserved  for  man,  the  highest 
known  organism,  to  be  capable  of  loving  the  whole 
world." 

With  this  attitude  of  mind  it  is  not  at  all  strange 
that  Miss  Fielde  returned  eagerly  and  even  joy- 
fully to  China  at  the  end  of  her  vacation.  Never- 
theless, her  going  involved  a  high  degree  of  genuine 
self-sacrifice.  During  her  stay  in  the  United  States, 
she  had  received  a  number  of  flattering  offers  of 
employment  in  positions  of  distinction  and  honor, 
one  of  which  was  the  presidency  of  Vassar  College. 
But  she  was  not  to  be  tempted  from  what  she  re- 
garded as  her  obvious  duty.  To  use  her  own  words : 
"The  wrinkled  faces  of  the  dear  Chinese  women 
always  glimmered  in  the  air  between  me  and  any 
turning  that  led  away  from  them.'* 

A    magazine    article,    published    in    November, 

Page  One  Hundred  Seventy-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

1885,   contains  the   following  account  of  her  re- 
turn voyage: 

"Swatow,  October  30th,  1885. 
"I  arrived  here  on  the  26th  inst,  after  a  sea-voy- 
age which  paralleled  in  wretchedness,  though  not 
in  length,  my  first  trip  to  China,  twenty  years  ago. 
The  City  of  Peking,  on  which  I  sailed  from  San 
Francisco,  September  19th,  carried  more  than 
twelve  hundred  Chinese  passengers,  whose  quart- 
ers were  in  the  fore  and  middle  part  of  the 
steamer,  while  the  European  passengers  oc- 
cupied the  after-part  of  the  vessel.  The  Chinese 
quarters  were  aerated  by  a  windsail,  extended  down 
through  the  forward  hatchway;  and  the  exit  of  all 
this  air  was  through  a  skylight  just  in  front  of  the 
saloon  and  deck  occupied  by  the  European  pas- 
sengers. When  the  wind  was  ahead,  which  hap- 
pened for  many  successive  days,  there  was  no  air 
to  breathe  except  as  such  was  mixed  from  the  great 
stream  of  foul  exhalations  rising  from  the  Chinese 
quarters.  Being  already  supersaturated  with  the 
effluvia  of  present  and  past  generations  of  Chinese, 
the  bad  air  gave  me  malarial  fever.  When  I  reach- 
ed Hongkong,  I  was  unable  to  be  removed  from  my 
berth,  and  remained  on  board  the  ship  four  days 
after  the  other  passengers  left.  I  was  then  trans- 
ferred to  the  Swatow  steamer,  and  reached  my  des- 
tination twenty-four  hours  later. 

"We  had  but  three  days  of  smooth  weather  dur- 
ing the  voyage  from  San  Francisco  to  Hongkong, 
and  encountered  two  typhoons.  The  first  was  on 

Page  One  Hundred   Seventy-Two 


Change  of  Religious  Opinion 

the  twentieth  day  out,  three  days  before  we  reach- 
ed Yokohama.  The  steamer  abandoned  her  course 
and  devoted  herself  to  outriding  the  gale  with  her 
head  to  the  wind.  The  waves  rose  as  high  as  the 
smokestacks,  dashing  into  the  saloons  through  the 
uppermost  windows,  broke  up  the  captain's  boat, 
and  smote  to  death  one  of  the  great  beautiful 
horses  on  deck.  Most  of  the  passengers  sat  up  all 
night,  saving  themselves  as  best  they  could  from  a 
breakage  of  bone. 

"The  second  typhoon,  on  the  day  after  we  left 
Japan,  was  severer  than  the  first;  and  our  captain, 
who  had  been  forty  years  at  sea,  said  he  had  never 
seen  worse.  The  bulwarks  were  broken,  the  boats 
all  carried  away  and  the  decks  washed  free  of  cargo 
and  living  freight.  Eighteen  sheep  and  lambs  went 
bleating  overboard,  with  other  animals,  to  sink  in 
the  surges.  There  were  many  hours  when  we 
seemed  at  foundering  point,  at  a  time  when  the 
slightest  misunderstanding  of  an  order,  an  instant's 
hesitation  in  carrying  out  a  command,  or  a  second's 
inattention  on  the  part  of  an  officer,  would  have 
determined  for  us  an  adverse  fate.  But  we  came 
at  last  to  the  haven  where  we  would  be. 

"Since  reaching  my  old  home  I  have  rapidly  re- 
covered, and  am  almost  well.  The  missionaries  in 
our  compound,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Partridge,  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Ashmore,  Jr.,  Miss  Norwood  and  Miss  Buz- 
zell,  are  all  doing  their  usual  work;  but  to  one  ac- 
customed to  the  bright  eyes  and  rosy  tints  in  New 
England  faces,  these  all  look  wan.  The  strain  of 

Page   One   Hundred    Seventy-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

the  physical,  mental  struggle  for  existence  is  almost 
always  visible  in  the  face  of  the  foreign  dweller  in 
the  Far  East." 

On  resuming  her  missionary  work  at  Swatow, 
Miss  Fielde  added  a  course  in  obstetrics  to  the  cur- 
ricula of  her  women's  training  school.  This  great- 
ly increased  the  burden  of  her  labors.  Practical 
demonstration  is  the  most  necessary  feature  of  this 
branch  of  education  and  she  was  often  compelled 
to  take  her  class  on  long  journeys  in  order  to  secure 
the  needed  clinical  instruction.  On  these  trips  she 
was  constantly  exposed  to  the  discomforts  of  rough 
travel  by  day  and  poor  housing  accommodations  at 
night.  Often,  too,  she  was  threatened  with  per- 
sonal violence  and  not  unfrequently  her  life  was 
endangered  by  superstitious  and  unfriendly  natives. 

On  one  of  these  latter  occasions  she  and  a  lady 
companion  were  surrounded  and  assailed  by  an  an- 
gry mob,  armed  with  stones,  knives  and  clubs.  The 
leader  of  the  uprising  was  a  large  powerful  man, 
who  had  worked  himself  into  a  frenzy  by  hoots, 
howls  and  various  Chinese  incantations.  He  ap- 
proached the  women  with  uplifted  spear,  manifest- 
ly intent  upon  instant  execution.  But  Miss  Fielde 
anticipated  the  attack  by  advancing  to  meet  him 
with  her  arm  uplifted  and  a  sharply  delivered  com- 
mand for  peace  and  silence.  Finding  her  absolutely 

Page   One   Hundred   Seventy-Four 


Change  of  Religious  Opinion 

unafraid,  the  man  halted  somewhat  disconcerted. 
He  was  not  at  all  sure  but  that  she  possessed  some 
occult  power  that  human  agency  could  not  over- 
come or  was  under  the  protection  of  some  guardian 
demon,  a  source  of  ever-present  dread  to  the  super- 
stitious Chinese.  Taking  advantage  of  his  hesita- 
tion, she  calmed  him  with  a  few  apt  quotations  of 
Confucianic  philosophy  and  then  proceeded  to  pre- 
sent her  claim  to  respectful  treatment  by  means  of 
the  most  convincing  Chinese  logic.  Before  finish- 
ing her  talk,  she  not  only  succeeded  in  gaining  the 
friendship  of  all  who  heard  her,  but  their  good  of- 
fices as  well.  They  invited  her  into  their  best 
homes,  made  her  comfortable,  provided  her  a  place 
to  preach  and  the  whole  village  turned  out  to  hear 
her  tell  the  "old,  old  story." 

In  a  letter  dated  January  1 2th,  1 889,  Miss  Fielde 
tells  of  another  way  in  which  her  Biblewomen  dis- 
pensed relief  to  the  ill  among  the  Chinese.  The  let- 
ter is  here  reproduced: 

"The  average  number  of  Biblewomen  at  work 
under  my  care  throughout  the  year  1 888,  has  been 
fourteen.  These  women  have  been  stationed  at 
chapels,  from  five  to  sixty  miles  from  here,  where 
each,  accompanied  by  a  local  guide,  could  visit  the 
village  within  walking  distance  from  the  chapels. 
During  the  year  the  fourteen  women  have,  on  an 
average,  visited  during  each  quarter,  two  hundred 

Page   One   Hundred  Seventy-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

and  seventeen  different  villages,  and  taught  in  six 
hundred  and  sixty-one  different  families.  Two 
weeks  out  of  each  quarter  are  spent  here  in  confer- 
ence with  each  other  and  with  the  missionaries. 
The  women  all  have  permission  to  spend  at  home 
one  week  in  each  quarter  of  the  year,  but  hardly 
half  of  them  avail  themselves  of  this  privilege. 

'Treasure*  has  continued  as  house-mother  in 
the  training-class  for  female  evangelists,  in  which 
the  average  number  of  students  through  the  year 
has  been  four. 

"During  last  summer  cholera  raged  with  peculiar 
virulence  in  this  region.  The  disease  assailed  its 
victims  so  suddenly  and  fatally  that  it  was  common 
for  them  to  die  by  the  roadside,  or  to  be  found  dead 
in  their  rooms  in  the  morning  without  having  ut- 
tered complaint  during  the  night.  Early  in  July 
the  Biblewomen  were  supplied  with  cholera  rem- 
edies, and  taught  how  to  administer  them,  and  on 
their  assembling  here  for  the  quarterly  conference 
in  September,  many  reported  a  goodly  number  of 
lives  saved,  doubtless  by  the  medicine.  One  wom- 
an treated  eleven  cases,  all  of  whom  recovered,  ex- 
cept one.  Some  of  the  Biblewomen  themselves  had 
need  to  take  the  medicine;  but  all  returned  to  see 
each  other's  faces,  and  to  thank  the  Lord  together, 
when  the  pestilence  had  passed. 

"My  work  has  been  desultory;  instructing  the 
Biblewomen  during  two  weeks  in  each  quarter, 
teaching  in  the  training-class  three  mornings  in  each 
week,  when  at  home,  and  attending  to  the  odds 

Page  One   Hundred   Seventy-Six 


Change  of  Religious  Opinion 

and  ends  of  which  life  is  mostly  made  up.  I  find 
myself  less  able  than  in  former  years  to  do  country 
work,  and  the  past  year  have  spent  but  seventeen 
days  therein,  visiting  eight  outstations.  I  am  this 
winter  superintending  the  erection  of  a  cottage  on 
Double  Island,  five  miles  seaward,  where  we  mis- 
sionaries can,  in  the  hot  weather,  resort  for  cooler 
air  and  sea-bathing.  The  cost  of  the  cottage  will 
be  about  eighteen  hundred  Mexican  dollars,  which 
have  been  supplied  chiefly  by  friends  in  New  York 
City. 

"Very  faithfully  yours, 

"Adele  M.  Fielde." 

To  Miss  Fielde  is  due  the  credit  of  inducing  sev- 
eral of  the  Protestant  Missionary  Societies  to  add 
women  physicians  to  their  corps  of  ^workers  in 
China.  While  in  Siam  she  discovered  the  Chinese 
antipathy  to  the  employment  of  male  physicians 
in  the  treatment  of  sex  disorders  peculiar  to  wom- 
en. She  felt  that  if  women  physicians  could  be 
made  a  feature  of  the  missionary  service  to  the 
Chinese,  it  would  not  only  prove  of  great  practical 
benefit  to  the  native  women  but  would  be  a  source 
of  considerable  influence  as  a  method  of  mission- 
ary propaganda.  Within  a  short  time  after  her  ar- 
rival in  the  Orient,  she  embodied  her  idea  in  a  let- 
ter to  the  Baptist  Missionary  headquarters  in  the 
United  States.  Her  suggestion  was  received  with 
much  favorable  comment  but  its  official  adoption 

Page   One   Hundred   Seventy-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

did  not  follow  as  a  result.  So  she  began  a  vigorous 
campaign  of  letter  writing  and  newspaper  and 
magazine  publication  with  a  view  of  creating  pub- 
lic sentiment  in  favor  of  the  plan  and  forcing  public 
opinion,  at  least,  to  give  it  the  consideration  it  de- 
served. But  it  was  not  until  seven  years  there- 
after that  the  seed  she  had  sown  bore  fruit.  An 
article  contained  in  a  Philadelphia  publication, 
April  8th,  1886,  sums  up  the  final  triumph  of  the 
great  task  her  love  for  humanity  led  her  to  per- 
form. A  portion  of  the  article  is  hereto  appended: 

"Away  up  near  the  great  wall  at  Kalgan,  five 
days'  journey  by  mule-litter  from  Peking,  there  is  a 
missionary  station  of  the  Congregationalists,  with 
four  American  families  and  many  Russian  tea- 
traders  among  20,000  Mongols  and  Chinese. 
There,  Dr.  Virginia  C.  Murdock  has  been  work- 
ing since  1881.  She  had  patients  two  hours 
after  her  arrival,  and  has  since  had  practice  among 
all  classes  in  the  city,  and  from  villages  as 
far  as  200  miles  away.  Two  wild  white  horses  are 
included  among  the  expressions  of  gratitude  that 
she  has  received  from  her  patients. 

"In  1885,  Dr.  A.  R.  Watson  of  the  English  Bap- 
tist Mission  arrived  in  China.  She  is  to  live  in  the 
Shantung  Province,  240  miles  from  Chefoo,  and 
is  to  have  care  of  the  women's  department  in  a  hos- 
pital where  her  husband  has  charge  of  a  men's  de- 
partment. Dr.  Watson  is  the  only  English  medical 

Page  One  Hundred  Seventy-Eight 


Change  of  Religious  Opinion 

lady  in  China,  all  the  dozen  other  medical  ladies 
being  American. 

"In  Chinkiang,  on  the  Yangtsze  river,  Dr.  Lucy 
H.  Hoag  of  the  Methodist  mission  opened  a  dis- 
pensary in  1884.  She  treated  over  2,000  patients 
during  the  first  year. 

"At  Shanghai,  there  are  two  hospitals  for  wom- 
en. One  is  in  the  Seventh  Day  Baptist  mission, 
and  is  under  the  care  of  Dr.  Ella  F.  Swinney,  who 
began  her  work  in  1 883.  She  had  nearly  six  thou- 
sand patients  during  the  first  year.  The  other  hos- 
pital is  the  Woman's  Union  Mission,  and  is  in  the 
charge  of  Dr.  E.  Reifsnyder,  who  began  her  work 
in  1884.  Dr.  Reifsnyder's  fame  has  been  spread 
among  the  Chinese  by  successful  surgical  opera- 
tions for  ovarian  tumor,  cancer  of  the  breast  and 
other  important  maladies.  Dr.  Ruth  McCown  has 
recently  arrived  in  Shanghai  to  establish  medical 
work  in  the  Southern  Baptist  mission. 

"There  is  dire  need  and  limitless  opportunity  for 
the  work  of  medical  missionary  ladies  in  China. 
Doubtless  the  ideal  scheme  is  that  which  includes 
a  hospital  and  itinerating  work,  with  two  correl- 
lated  departments,  one  for  men  under  the  charge 
of  a  man,  and  one  for  women  under  the  charge 
of  a  woman.  This  plan  among  people  holding  such 
notions  of  propriety  as  do  the  Chinese  would  prob- 
ably secure  the  highest  success  in  a  medical  enter- 
prise. Physicians  of  either  sex  may  treat  persons 
of  the  opposite  sex  for  many  diseases;  but  they 
may  treat  only  those  of  their  own  sex  for  all  dis- 

Pagre  One  Hundred  Seventy-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 


eases. 

* 'Knowledge  of  the  vernacular  is  indispensable 
to  the  medical  missionary,  as  well  as  those  engaged 
in  evangelistic  work,  and  it  is  wise  to  spend  one  or 
two  years  in  a  study  of  the  local  dialect  before  be- 
ginning medical  work  among  the  people.  When 
once  the  help  of  a  physician  is  known  to  be  within 
reach,  the  demand  for  it  is  so  constant  as  to  leave 
no  time  for  study. 

"Thorough  training  is  especially  necessary  for 
this  service  in  Pagandom,  because  the  physician  is 
usually  isolated  from  others  of  his  profession  and 
is  unable  to  call  a  specialist,  or  to  secure  consulta- 
tion in  difficult  cases. 

"Skill  in  surgery  is  of  importance,  because  the 
native  practitioners,  who  are  often  learned  in  the 
use  of  herbs,  are  ignorant  of  anatomy,  and  in  their 
surgical  performances  make  the  most  harmful  mis- 
takes. Moreover,  the  good  effects  of  skilful  surg- 
ery are  so  evident  that  they  quickly  win  confidence 
and  give  prestige  to  the  foreign  physician.  All  the 
insight,  the  preparation  and  the  appliances  which 
are  needful  for  sterling  work  in  America  are  re- 
quisite here.  Having  these,  the  lady  medical  mis- 
sionary has  a  sphere  all  her  own,  in  which  she  may 
relieve  human  suffering  that  no  one  else  can  reach, 
and  give  an  uplift  to  hearts  that  no  one  else  can 
touch.  "Adele  M.  Fielde." 


Page  One  Hundred  Eighty 


CHAPTER  FIFTEEN 

« 

111  At  Fielde  Lodge;  Resignation  From  Missionary 
Service;  Her  Reasons  for  So  Doing 

IN  THE  summer  of  1 889,  Miss  Fielde  tendered 
her  resignation  as  a  missionary  teacher  in  the 
service  of  the  Baptist  church,  which  was  ac- 
cepted the  following  fall.  There  are  two  causes 
which  induced  her  to  take  this  step,  one  of  which 
is  a  matter  of  public  record,  the  other,  largely  tra- 
ditional. Failing  health  was  the  ostensible  reason 
for  her  voluntary  retirement,  but  the  other,  even 
more  important  to  her,  was  due  to  conscientious 
scruples.  This  second  cause  became  apparent  when 
we  consider  that  at  that  time  she  was  possessed  of 
very  little  money,  and  had  she  chosen  to  remain  in 
the  service  only  a  few  months  longer,  she  would 
have  been  retired  on  a  pension  sufficiently  large  to 
have  enabled  her  to  pass  the  remainder  of  her  life 
in  comfortable  leisure.  But  she  had  outgrown 
many  of  the  dogmas  of  the  church,  and,  while  she 
had  no  objection  to  her  remuneration  as  a  teacher 
of  morality,  still  her  conscience  would  not  permit 
her  to  accept  the  gratuitous  bounty  of  the  church 
while  unable  to  subscribe  to  each  and  every  article 
of  faith  and  creed  on  which  that  institution  was  or- 
ganized. Many  of  her  friends  and  co-workers  tried 
to  persuade  her  to  take  the  pension,  advancing  the 

Page  One  Hundred  Eighty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

argument  that  by  her  splendid  achievements  and 
long  and  self-sacrificing  devotion  to  duty  in  the 
Orient,  she  had  honestly  earned  it.  But  without 
avail. 

In  a  number  of  private  letters  to  Dr.  Edward  J. 
Nolan,  written  between  the  months  of  June  and 
November,  1889,  she  expresses  her  determination 
to  take  final  leave  of  China,  giving  ill-health  as  her 
only  reason  for  so  doing.  Excerpts  from  several 
of  these  letters  follow,  which  are  here  printed  for 
the  first  time: 

"The  summer  here  has  been  remarkable  for 
heat  and  unhealthiness.  Cholera  has  raged  since 
May,  and  is  still  spreading.  The  superstitions  of 
the  people  tend  by  their  exercise  to  increase  the 
scourge  which  they  pray  their  gods  to  remove.  Then 
we  have  had  a  plague  of  caterpillars,  bred  on  the 
Pinus  Sinensis  with  which  our  hills  are  covered. 
With  persistent  aspirations,  which  would  ennoble 
creatures  with  fewer  feet,  they  creep  ever  upward. 
And  when  they  have  left  the  pine  trees  bare  and 
black,  they  crawl  up  the  walls  of  our  houses,  and 
would  swarm  into  our  inmost  rooms  if  we  did  not 
keep  men  sweeping  them  out.  All  through  July 
they  were  a  sickening  horror.  On  the  evening  of 
the  4th  of  July  I  dined  at  Baron  von  Seckendoffs 
and  was  surprised  to  find  the  guests  and  the  banquet 
an  unutterable  weariness.  The  next  morning  I  was 
ill  and  Dr.  Courland  came  and  said  I  had  quinsy.  A 

Page  One  Hundred  Eighty-Two 


Ill  At  Fielde  Lodge 

severe  attack  of  this  painful  malady  kept  me  in  bed 
two  weeks,  and  was  followed  by  a  persistent  slight 
fever,  from  which  I  have  not  as  yet  recovered/' 

On  June  1  1  th,  she  writes  to  Dr.  Nolan : 

"I  am  now  staying  at  Fielde  Lodge  on  Double 
Island.  The  cottage  which  I  built  last  winter  has 
been  so  named  by  the  lady  who  gave  the  dollars 
(Mrs.  E.  M.  Cauldwell)  to  make  this  rest-house  by 
the  sea,  and,  though  I  struggled  hard  to  have  it 
named  after  her,  she  declared  that  we  would  have 
our  first  quarrel  if  I  did  not  yield;  and  so  "Fielde 
Lodge"  it  is.  One  cannot  quarrel  with  one's  guard- 
ian angels,  even  when  they  refuse  to  have  their 
wings  burnished  with  a  little  foreign  luster. 

"I  have  not  been  well  since  the  summer  came 
and  Dr.  Lyall  tells  me  that  it  will  be  best  for  me  to 
seek  a  cold  climate  soon.  My  long  residence  in  the 
tropics  has  produced  muscular  weakness  of  the 
heart,  which  is  great  enough  to  prevent  my  safely 
continuing  the  work.  I  am  to  stay  here  at  the  Is- 
land during  this  summer,  as  I  cannot  at  once  lay 
aside  all  my  duties  and  responsibilities.  When  the 
weather  becomes  cool  in  October  I  will  return  to  my 
usual  domicile  and  get  ready  to  leave  China.  It  is 
probable  that  I  will  leave  Swatow  at  the  end  of  next 
November.  So,  unless  you  should  hear  other  ad- 
vice, do  not  send  anything  to  reach  me  later  than 
that  time.  I  may  go  via  India  and  Europe  but  will 
write  you  later  about  that. 

"I  wish  you  would  send  me  two  or  three  letters 

Page   One   Hundred  Eighty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

of  introduction  to  Dr.  Dorhn,  the  superintendent  of 
the  zoological  station  at  Naples.  Probably  Naples 
will  be  so  hot  at  the  time  of  my  arrival  there  that 
it  will  be  inexpedient  for  me  to  stay  very  long.  But 
I  hope  to  be  able  to  visit  that  delightful  institution 
and  to  spend  a  little  time  in  it.  If  Dr.  Leidy,  Dr. 
MacCook,  you  or  any  others  whose  names  would 
be  familiar  to  Professor  Dorhn  would  be  so  kind  to 
give  me  letters  to  him,  I  should  esteem  the  favor 
very  highly.  I  suppose  Professor  Sharp,  who 
knows  Dorhn,  is  away  at  some  summer  retreat  or 
perhaps  in  Europe.  If  he  is  in  Philadelphia,  kindly 
ask  him  also  for  a  letter. 

"Please  do  not  be  at  all  anxious  about  my  health. 
Dr.  Lyall  tells  me  I  may  live  to  good  old  age  in  a 
cool  climate.  He  prescribes  activity  without  excite- 
ment or  fatigue  at  present,  and  then  no  further 
residence  in  torrid  countries.  The  heart  tonics  he 
is  giving  me  are  acting  admirably.  I  am  always  am- 
enable to  medical  remedies,  and  after  this  summer 
is  gone,  I  doubt  not  I  shall  be  myself  again,  full  of 
projects  and  eager  to  execute  them;  but  they  will 
all  lie  in  Christendom." 

September  1  st,  1 889,  Miss  Fielde  again  writes 
to  Dr.  Nolan: 

"Your  kind  anxiety  makes  me  write  at  once  after 
the  receipt  of  your  recent  letter.  I  am  no  worse 
than  when  I  last  wrote  you.  The  fall  has  been  an 
unusually  cool  one,  most  fortunately  for  me;  and 
this  retreat  where  the  freshest  air  of  the  coast  is 

Page  One  Hundred  Eighty-Four 


Ill  At  Fielde  Lodge 

found,  has  had  much  to  do  with  my  having  safely 
passed  the  hot  weather.  Lately  the  thermometer 
has  been  down  to  eighty  degrees  Fahrenheit  and  I 
have  improved  in  health  so  much  as  to  be  confirm- 
ed in  my  expectations  that  I  will  be  sound  and  sane 
after  a  year  of  out-of-door  exercise  in  a  cold  climate. 
Next  week  I  am  to  return  to  my  former  domicile  to 
begin  preparations  to  leave  Swatow.  I  purpose  dis- 
posing of  all  my  work  as  I  must  hereafter  stay  out- 
side the  tropics.  There  is  a  certain  satisfaction  in 
having  this  decision  made  by  circumstances,  else 
I  might  not  be  wholly  sure  that  I  had  no  further 
duty  in  behalf  of  the  Chinese  women,  for  whom  I 
have  so  long  worked,  and  for  the  Biblewomen  who 
have  such  a  hold  on  my  affections.  As  it  is,  I  have 
no  doubts  what  I  ought  to  do;  and  so  I  close  my 
labors  here  with  a  peaceful  mind.  As  I  shall  be 
very  busy  with  preparations  for  travel,  I  may  not 
send  you  any  more  letters  from  Swatow,  but  will 
write  a  postal  or  two  to  tell  you  of  my  welfare.  I 
expect  to  leave  China  early  in  December  and  go  to 
Europe.  If  I  should  find  Germany  cold  enough  for 
my  health  I  shall  probably  spend  next  summer 
there,  under  medical  treatment.  If  I  keep  as  well 
as  I  am  now,  I  shall  probably  journey  through 
Northern  India,  where  the  air  is  dry  and  cold  during 
January  and  February.  Direct  your  next  letter  to 
me,  care  of  Miss  Gardner,  39  Elliott  Road,  Calcut- 
ta, India,  writing  so  that  the  letter  will  reach  Cal- 
cutta before  the  middle  of  January  next.  I  cannot 

Page  One   Hundred  Eighty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

now  give  you  a  later  address,  but  will  send  one  a 
month  or  so  hence. 

*'I  will  not  regard  the  infrequency  of  your  letters 
but  will  thus  *make  merit/  like  a  Buddhist,  believ- 
ing that  the  paper  rags  I  offer  will  in  due  time  be 
transmuted  into  what  is  of  greater  worth,  and  come 
back  to  me  for  my  weal.  I  hope  to  write  you 
from  under  the  dome  of  Taj  Mahal  and  perhaps 
from  some  spot  where  Mt.  Everest  will  glow  upon 
the  sheet.  And  then,  sometime,  when  I  am  stay- 
ing at  home  and  you  are  traipsing  around  the  world 
you  will  pay  your  epistolary  debts,  good  gold  for 
my  poor  script." 

November  30th,  1889,  Miss  Fielde  left  China 
for  the  last  time.  Despite  the  philosophical  atti- 
tude expressed  in  the  preceding  letter,  she  was  al- 
most heart-broken  when  the  moment  of  her  de- 
parture arrived.  She  had  passed  a  quarter  of  a  cen- 
tury among  the  Chinese,  years  of  great  usefulness 
to  others  and  of  great  interest  to  herself.  She  was 
strongly  attached  to  her  missionary  co-workers  and 
Chinese  helpers  by  ties  of  genuine  affection.  She 
knew  that  she  would  never  again  see  her  beloved 
Biblewomen,  and  they  realized  that  their  "Love 
Woman"  was  leaving  them  forever. 

During  her  long  association  with  the  people  of 
China,  Miss  Fielde  had  learned  to  know  them  and 
to  understand  the  Chinese  character  as  few  other 

Page  One  Hundred  Eighty-Six 


Ill  At  Fielde  Lodge 

Europeans.  Her  opinions  regarding  them  was 
fairly  well  summed  up  in  a  newspaper  article,  writ- 
ten by  Augusta  Larnard  and  published  in  the  Bos- 
ton Register,  March,  1 894,  from  which  the  follow- 
ing excerpts  are  taken: 

"All  Souls'  Alliance,  at  two  of  its  recent  meet- 
ings, has  had  the  privilege  of  listening  to  addresses 
by  Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde,  a  lady  formerly  connect- 
ed with  the  Baptist  Board  of  Foreign  Missions, 
who  spent  twenty-five  years  in  China.  It  is  inter- 
esting to  note  that  during  her  work  among  the  Ce- 
lestials, Miss  Fielde  grew  out  of  Orthodoxy  into  an 
enlightened  and  broad-minded  liberalism.  She  saw 
the  good  side  of  Confucianism  and  Buddhism,  and 
was  gradually  compelled  to  teach  a  monotheistic 
creed  with  strong  ethical  emphasis.  She  acquired 
a  thorough  knowledge  of  the  Chinese  tongue  after 
several  years  of  study,  and  was  thus  enabled  to 
travel  in  all  parts  of  the  empire,  to  penetrate  into 
native  houses,  to  converse  with  people  of  every 
class,  to  get  more  than  a  glimpse  of  the  Chinese 
consciousness  and  the  inner  life  of  the  people — 
their  modes  of  thought,  the  ideas  by  which  they  are 
governed,  the  genius  which  controls  them.  She  in- 
terested herself  intelligently  in  their  creeds  and  su- 
perstitions, and  strove  to  understand  the  springs 
of  that  strange  Mongolian  life. 

"On  Friday  last  Miss  Fielde  gave  an  instructive 
address  on  Confucius  and  the  manner  in  which  he 
dominates  Chinese  thought,  even  to  the  smallest 
details  of  dress  and  ceremonial.  Confucianism  is  a 

Page  One  Hundred   Eighty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

looking  backward;  its  mainspring,  supreme  rever- 
ence for  the  past.  The  people,  therefore,  have  their 
faces  turned  away  from  progress,  and  are  not  only 
indifferent  but  inimical  to  its  results.  They  have, 
however,  great  respect  for  wisdom,  and  Miss 
Fielde,  on  her  journeys  into  the  interior,  when  she 
found  herself  surrounded  by  a  crowd  of  hostile  na- 
tives, had  but  to  repeat  one  or  two  of  the  sayings 
of  Confucius  to  restore  them  to  good  humor  and 
chase  the  scowls  from  their  faces.  Confucianism  is 
grafted  on  an  old  nature  worship,  going  back  to  re- 
motest times.  Ancestor-worship  is  doubtless  rooted 
in  this  same  soil.  Confucius  added  little  or  noth- 
ing to  the  faith  of  his  fathers.  He  was  a  restorer 
rather  than  a  creator.  He  is  believed  to  have  gath- 
ered the  wisdom  with  which  he  is  credited  into  pithy 
and  easily  remembered  sentences.  Although  he  is 
an  historical  character  whose  life  is  known  in  every 
detail,  by  a  mythical  evolution  he  has  become  a 
god — the  highest  in  the  Chinese  pantheon.  Father 
Heaven  and  Mother  Earth  are  still  adored,  and 
there  are  river  deities  and  other  genii.  The  Chinese 
objection  to  railroads  is  based  on  the  popular  idea 
that  Mother  Earth  is  a  sentient  being,  who  suffers 
pain  when  her  members  are  torn  or  pierced.  Min- 
ing is  also  prohibited,  although  the  country  is  rich 
in  mineral  deposits.  One  short  railroad  of  twelve 
miles,  built  by  an  American,  has  been  destroyed 
because  of  the  injury  it  was  supposed  to  inflict  on 
the  common  mother;  for  when  she  is  made  very 
angry  by  blasting  or  boring  in  her  body,  she  sends 

Page    One   Hundred    Eighty-Eight 


Ill  At  Fielde  Lodge 

floods  and  pestilence.  When  a  Chinese  digs  a  hole 
in  the  ground  to  lay  the  foundation  of  his  house, 
he  burns  paper  money  and  offers  prayers  to  pro- 
pitiate the  offended  deity.  The  cosmogony  of  the 
educated  Chinese  is  like  that  of  the  ancient 
Greeks.  They  believe  the  earth  to  be  a  flat  plain, 
mainly  occupied  by  their  own  country,  literally  the 
Middle  Kingdom.  An  ocean  stream  surrounds  it; 
and  Europe,  America,  etc.,  are  dotted  about  in  this 
stream  like  small  islands.  The  governor  of  a  prov- 
ince who  had  travelled  in  Europe,  ventured  to  in- 
troduce to  his  people  a  modern  map,  showing  the 
true  position  of  China  on  the  earth's  surface,  and 
in  consequence  was  deposed  from  office. 

"When  a  foreigner  speaks  to  a  Chinaman  of 
modern  inventions,  such  as  the  telephone,  electric 
telegraph,  etc.,  he  replies:  'Oh,  yes;  we  had  them 
here  seven  hundred  years  ago,  but  we  found  them 
not  useful  and  gave  them  up/  A  Chinese  ambasssa- 
dor  at  the  court  of  Berlin,  on  his  return  home,  wrote 
a  little  book,  in  which  he  imprudently  described 
some  modern  scientific  discoveries,  and  as  a  reward 
his  house  was  looted  and  torn  down  by  his  coun- 
trymen. Confucius,  it  seems,  was  not  a  great 
truth-teller;  and  his  people  have  copied  him  in  the 
matter  of  mendacity.  The  Chinese  honor  highly 
superior  men.  Why  have  they  not  more  among 
themselves?  Miss  Fielde  finds  the  cause  in  Con- 
fucianism, which  develops  the  individual  desire  for 
perfection  in  moral  and  ceremonial,  but  has  no  doc- 
trine of  the  higher  idealism,  no  belief  in  God  or 
self-sacrifice.'* 

Page  One  Hundred  Eighty-Nine 


CHAPTER  SIXTEEN 

Journey  to  India;  Impressions  of  That  Country; 
The  Taj  Mahal 

rTjT^HERE  is  no  available  written  account  of  Miss 
Fielde's  journey  from  Swatow  to  India,  but 
it  must  have  been  made  by  sea.  It  is  also 
probable  that  she  circumnavigated  the  Malay  Pen- 
insula, as  there  were  no  railways  at  that  time  cross- 
ing that  section  of  the  Far  East.  From  Swatow  to 
Calcutta  is  about  three  thousand  miles  by  water, 
and,  as  the  coastwise  steamers  of  thirty-five  years 
ago  were  comparatively  slow,  it  is  safe  to  presume 
that  the  voyage  took  two  weeks  or  possibly  three 
weeks  to  make. 

Miss  Fielde  remained  in  India  nearly  three 
months,  devoting  that  time  to  systematic  study  of 
the  Hindu  personality,  character,  habits  of  thought, 
intellectual  and  moral  development,  advance  in  civ- 
ilization, progress  in  art  and  knowledge  of  science. 
According  to  the  many  published  articles  and  pri- 
vate letters  she  wrote  at  that  time,  now  in  the  pos- 
session of  the  writer  hereof,  she  was  not  at  all  fa- 
vorably impressed  with  India  as  a  place  of  resi- 
dence or  with  its  inhabitants  as  a  race.  Her  con- 
clusions, as  a  result  of  her  studies  and  investiga- 
tions, may  be  summed  up  as  follows:  They  are 
an  indolent,  dreamy,  improvident  people;  so 

Page   One   Hundred   Ninety 


Journey  to  India 

wedded  to  old  ideas  and  old  customs,  that  the  race 
is  practically  at  a  hopeless  standstill.  She  further 
expressed  the  opinion  that  the  Hindus  are  decidedly 
"shiftless"  to  use  a  New  England  idiom.  Though 
the  agricultural  capabilities  of  the  country  are  suffi- 
cient to  provide  subsistence  for  nearly  double  the 
population,  yet  every  few  years  millions  die  of 
starvation.  The  rural  districts  abound  with  pre- 
datory wild  animals  and  venomous  reptiles  which 
cause  the  death  of  thousands  of  human  beings  and 
countless  numbers  of  domestic  animals  annually. 
This,  in  face  of  the  fact  that  these  scourges  could 
be  absolutely  exterminated  by  a  few  well  organized 
drives,  such  as  are  made  in  the  wild  places  of  every 
civilized  country.  Miss  Fielde  visited  a  hamlet 
near  which  a  man-eating  tiger  had  occupied  a  cave 
for  ten  years,  the  presence  of  which  compelled 
the  hundred  or  more  dwellers  in  the  town  to  always 
remain  indoors  after  nightfall.  On  asking  why 
the  animal  hadn't  been  hunted  down  and  killed  long 
ago,  Miss  Fielde  was  astonished  to  be  told  that  such 
an  action  would  be  hardly  worth  the  trouble,  as  the 
tiger  did  not  devour  more  than  five  or  six  children 
a  year. 

In  Miss  Fielde's  opinion  the  much  heralded  oc- 
cult power  and  occult  wisdom  of  the  Hindus  is 
largely  imaginary.  While  some  of  the  fakirs  and 

Page  One  Hundred  Ninety-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

yogis  do  perform  marvelous  feats  of  alleged  magic, 
yet  she  felt  that  the  sources  of  their  mysterious 
power  were  self-hypnotism  and  their  ability  to  hyp- 
notize others,  an  art  which  long  study  had  made 
them  familiar  with  and  practice  had  made  them  ex- 
pert. She  also  found  them  ignorant  of  the  science 
of  medicine  and  their  knowledge  of  the  art  of  heal- 
ing was  entirely  empirical,  of  the  most  primitive 
kind.  Their  sanitary  conditions  were  frightful  and 
their  social  customs  abhorrent.  Their  religion  is 
little  more  than  fetich  worship  and  a  superstitious 
dependence  on  the  potency  of  charms  and  the  mys- 
ticism of  signs  and  symbols.  Their  moral  code  is 
strictly  negative,  even  more  so  than  the  provisions 
of  the  Hebrew  Pentateuch.  It  simply  provides  pen- 
alties for  offences  against  ancient  and  often  obso- 
lete customs,  with  little  regard  to  the  administration 
of  justice,  but  with  the  fine  discrimination  and  close 
adherence  to  the  letter  of  the  law. 

Apparently  Miss  Fielde  is  inclined  to  credit  the 
Hindus  with  pre-eminence  in  their  conception  of 
some  branches  of  the  fine  arts,  notably  in  the  man- 
ufacture of  textile  fabrics  and  magnificent  jewelry, 
and  especially  in  architecture.  In  a  private  letter 
to  a  Philadelphia  friend  she  expatiates  on  the  beau- 
ties of  the  Taj  Mahal  as  follows: 

Page  One  Hundred  Ninety-Two 


Journey  to  India 

"Agra,  India,  January  27th,  1890. 
"In  no  one  day  of  my  life  have  I  ever  seen  so 
much  magnificence  in  architecture  as  today.  See- 
ing Notre  Dame  of  Paris,  St.  Peter's  in  Rome,  St. 
Mark's  in  Venice,  the  Ming  Tombs,  and  the  House 
of  the  Prophets,  has  been  but  a  preparation  for 
due  appreciation  of  the  Taj.  The  Cathedral  of 
Milan,  that  mass  of  frozen  music,  is  so  wholly  un- 
like this  begemmed  work  of  ice  and  frost,  that  it 
may  be  thought  of  in  terms  of  contrast  but  not  in 
comparison.  The  mausoleum  of  Mumtag  the  Beau- 
tiful surpasses  every  other  piece  of  architecture  in 
the  exquisite  loveliness  of  its  detail  as  well  as  the 
grandeur  of  its  design.  Scores  of  windows,  and  the 
spacious  screen  that  surrounds  the  tomb  are  of  lace- 
like  fineness,  seen  at  a  little  distance.  They  are 
carved  out  of  pure  white  marble.  The  only  wood 
in  the  whole  structure  is  the  carved  sandal  wood 
doors;  and  the  only  metal,  two  bronze  doors,  all 
in  outer  alcoves.  Everything  else  is  of  snowy 
stone,  inlaid  with  carnelian,  jasper,  bloodstone, 
lapis  lazula,  malachite,  turquoise  and  gems,  in  pat- 
terns, graceful  as  nature's  own.  I  cannot  tell  you 
what  it  is  to  see  this  tomb,  built  by  Shah  Jehan  for 
the  'Distinguished  of  the  Harem.*  It  grows  on 
one  through  hours  of  gazing  and  seems  fairer  and 
fairer  the  longer  one  looks.  Some  power  in  the 
place  makes  the  beholder  pensive.  I  was  told  to- 
day of  a  stolid,  unimaginative  man  who  burst  into 
tears  upon  entering  the  Taj,  stirred  to  distress  by 
its  wondrous  spiritual  influence.  The  architecture 

Page  One  Hundred  Ninety-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

here  is  worth  a  journey  around  the  world  to  see. 
Not  only  the  Taj,  but  the  magnificent  Pearl  Mosque, 
the  Audience  Hall  of  Akbar,  grandson  of  the  first 
Mogul  emperor,  and  other  structures  are  the  finest 
I  have  ever  seen." 

In  the  National  Baptist  Magazine  of  April 
9th,  1891,  Miss  Fielde  published  a  further  descrip- 
tion of  the  Taj  : 

"The  Taj  is  the  Mausoleum  of  Mumtag,  the 
Beautiful.  She  died  in  1 630,  when  she  gave  birth 
to  Aurangzib,  third  son  of  Shah  Jehan.  For  a  lit- 
tle while  her  body  lay  in  the  corner  of  a  garden, 
doubtless  one  in  which  she  had  often  walked  and 
talked  with  her  imperial  lover  and  husband.  Then 
her  grave  was  made  ready  in  the  center  of  the  gar- 
den, and  there  she  still  rests,  under  the  most  won- 
drous monument  that  has  ever  been  raised  to  love 
and  woman.  If,  as  it  is  said,  it  took  twenty  thou- 
sand workmen  twenty- two  years  to  build  it,  they 
were  well  employed  in  their  day,  for  the  joy  of  fu- 
ture generations.  India,  China,  Thibet,  Ceylon, 
Persia,  Bagdad  and  other  countries  contributed 
from  their  quarries  to  build  the  wonderful  struct- 
ure. The  tribute  of  all  nations  under  the  emper- 
or's rule  was,  for  the  time  being,  taken  in  stones; 
and  native  princes  made  presents,  voluntary  or 
otherwise,  of  such  of  their  possessions  as  suited 
the  lapidary's  hand.  Master  masons,  stone  cutters, 
and  illuminators  were  brought  from  far  to  exhaust 
their  skill  upon  this  sepulchre  of  the  peerless  one. 

Page   One   Hundred   Ninety-Four 


Journey  to  India 

And  the  result  stands  in  the  complete,  the  unique, 
the  glorious  Taj. 

"Its  outer  enclosure  is  a  high  thick  wall  of  red 
sandstone  with  grand  gateways  on  three  sides.  The 
usual  entrance  is  through  the  southern  gate,  a  vast 
and  noble  structure  of  red  sandstone  inlaid  with 
black  and  white  marble,  its  lofty  arches  surmount- 
ed by  twenty-six  cupolas  and  flanked  by  colonades 
extending  the  southeast  and  southwest  corners  of 
the  enclosure,  where,  at  each  angle,  a  beautiful 
three-storied  pavilion  terminates  the  rampart.  The 
enclosed  quadrangle  measures  eighteen  hundred 
and  sixty  feet  from  east  to  west,  and  one 
thousand  feet  from  north  to  south.  It  is  laid 
out  as  a  garden,  with  fine  trees  and  flower- 
ing shrubs  shading  smoothly  paved  walks  and 
grassy  parterres.  A  marble  tank,  in  which  gold 
fish  sport  along  a  line  of  fountains,  extends  through 
the  long  vista  from  the  southern  gateway  to  the 
northern  end  of  the  garden,  and  reflects  in  its  shin- 
ing waters  the  majestic  contour  of  the  Taj.  Across 
the  northern  end  of  the  quadrangle  is  a  red  sand- 
stone platform,  and  at  either  end  of  this  platform  is 
a  mosque  of  red  sandstone,  richly  inlaid  with  col- 
ored marble,  and  each  flanked  on  both  the  northern 
and  southern  sides  by  beautiful  pavilions,  crowned 
with  white  marble  kiosks.  These  two  mosques 
face  a  superb  terrace  of  white  marble,  which  rises 
in  the  center  of  the  platform  and  is  3 1  3  feet  square. 
At  each  corner  of  the  terrace  is  a  tower  of  white 
marble  exquisitely  proportioned,  1 50  feet  high, 

Page   One  Hundred  Ninety-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

surrounded  by  three  marble  balconies  on  different 
levels.  In  the  center  of  the  terrace,  which  over- 
looks the  Jumna  on  the  north,  the  two  mosques  on 
the  east  and  west  and  the  garden  on  the  south, 
stands  the  Taj.  It  is  an  irregular  octagon,  its  four 
chief  sides  facing  the  four  cardinal  points,  and  each 
of  its  eight  angles  formed  by  a  noble  pillar  extend- 
ing above  the  roof  and  terminating  in  a  minaret. 
Four  magnificent  arches  extend  from  pedestal  to 
cornice  in  the  center  of  the  four  sides,  while  on 
either  side  of  these  vast  arches  are  two  lesser  ones, 
one  above  the  other,  matching  the  similar  arches 
that  form  and  fill  the  four  corners  of  the  pile.  All 
around  the  structure  between  its  outer  and  inner 
circuits  of  arched  alcoves,  there  runs  an  arcade  in 
which  octagonal  chambers  alternate  with  quadran- 
gular ones.  The  great  central  hall  is  octagonal, 
fifty-eight  feet  across,  and  surrounded  by  arched 
alcoves  whose  outer  wall  admits  light  through  mar- 
ble tracery  of  the  most  intricate  patterns.  Under- 
neath the  marble  floor  of  this  main  hall  is  a  vault 
which  may  be  entered  by  a  marble  stairway  under 
the  southern  archway.  The  vaulted  crypt  is  all  of 
white  marble,  and  it  is  lighted  only  through  its 
door.  In  the  center  of  the  vault  is  the  tomb  of 
Mumtag,  a  white  marble  cenotaph  with  the  ninety- 
nine  names  of  God  inlaid  in  Arabic,  in  black  mar- 
ble. Beside  her,  under  a  somewhat  higher  ceno- 
taph, lies  Shah  Jehan,  who  survived  her  by  thirty- 
five  years.  Immediately  above  these  real  tombs 
in  the  main  hall,  the  two  cenotaphs  are  duplicated 

Page  One  Hundred  Ninety-Six 


Journey  to  India 

on  a  larger  scale,  and  with  still  greater  and  more 
skillful  workmanship.  They  are  of  white  marble, 
inlaid  with  colored  stones,  the  fairest  flowers  of  the 
Orient  being  thus  made  to  lie  forever  fadeless  on 
the  bank  of  eternal  snow.  Half  way  between  these 
tombs  and  the  sculptured  and  begemmed  walls, 
there  is  an  encircling  screen,  upon  which  the  lapi- 
dary's art  has  culminated.  The  screen  is  over  six 
feet  high,  and  is  two  or  three  inches  in  thickness; 
but  so  delicate  is  the  white  marble  tracery  in  which 
iris  and  rose  mingle  and  repeat  themselves,  that  the 
lace-like  softness  and  the  ivory  sheen  suggest  silk 
rather  than  stone,  as  the  substance  wrought  upon. 
This  marble  lace-work  is  surrounded  by  a  frame  of 
polished  stone,  from  which  orchids  and  lillies  of 
vivid  hues  gleam  forth. 

"And  all  around,  in  the  halls,  alcoves,  chambers, 
in  and  out,  are  wainscotings,  entablatures,  cornices, 
pediments,  capitals  carved  in  relief  or  set  with  bril- 
liant stones,  in  flowers  in  geometrical  figures,  in 
conventional  designs.  The  whole  Koran  is  said  to 
be  laid  in  black  marble  letters  on  the  white  ground- 
work. The  work  of  the  jeweler  finishes  every- 
where the  efforts  of  the  architect  and  mason.  Over 
all  is  the  grand  dome  rising  almost  twice  as  high  as 
the  walls  and  capped  by  a  crescent,  260  feet  above 
the  ground  level.  Under  this  dome  lingers  an  echo, 
the  sweetest  in  the  world. 

"One  evening  I  went  with  some  friends,  who 
sang  a  lament  beside  the  tomb  of  the  fair  Mumtag, 
in  her  native  tongue.  A  whole  choir  of  angels 

Page  One  Hundred  Ninety-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

seemed  to  be  hidden  in  the  dome,  and  to  join  in  the 
dirge.  A  musical  instrument,  carried  with  us,  ut- 
tered a  single  note,  and  gave  the  key  to  an  invisible 
orchestra,  that  continued  to  play  a  heavenly  sym- 
phony long  after  the  ruder  sound  had  sunk  into  sil- 
ence. Music  infinitely  sweet,  clear,  and  soul-touch- 
ing, was  sent  back  to  us  for  our  poor  utterance, 
multifold  responses  for  our  single  suggestion. 

4 'I  saw  the  Taj  blush  roseate  at  sunrise;  gleam 
white  as  eternal  snows  at  noonday;  and  glimmer 
like  *a  house  not  made  with  hands'  through  the 
moonlight.  It  is  unspeakably  beautiful  in  all  its 
aspects;  but  most  impressive  when,  under  the  full 
moon,  it  appears  as  a  spiritual  creation. 

"Art  does  not  at  once  reach  the  crest  of  its  high- 
est wave;  and  so,  as  we  should  expect,  this  country 
is  remarkable  for  its  beautiful  structures  besides 
the  Taj.  The  workmen  who  made  it,  wrought  be- 
fore and  after  they  built  it.  Their  descendants  still 
continue  their  craft,  and  on  paying  demand,  can 
build  or  restore  equally  fine  temples." 


Page   One   Hundred  Ninety-Eight 


CHAPTER  SEVENTEEN 

In  Egypt;  The  Holy  City;  Ancient  and  Modern 
Greece;  Taking  the  Waters  of  Carlsbad 

FROM  India  Miss  Fielde  went  to  Egypt,  mak- 
ing Cairo  her  headquarters  while  visiting  the 
principal  places  of  interest  of  that  historic 
country.  There  is  little  in  her  writings  from  there 
that  is  indicative  of  her  impressions  concerning  the 
land  of  the  Pharaohs.  In  a  postal  card  addressed 
from  the  Hotel  D'Angleterre,  Cairo,  dated  March 
9th,  1 890,  she  states  that  she  has  been  in  that  city 
six  days  and  has  seen  many  of  the  most  interesting 
sights.  She  also  expresses  the  opinion  that  the 
most  impressive  of  her  Egyptian  experiences  was 
that  of  looking  into  the  eyes  of  those  which  saw 
Moses,  seeing  the  mouth  that  commanded  his  des- 
truction and  the  face  from  which  the  great  Law- 
giver fled.  The  mummies  of  both  Rameses  II  and 
Seti  I  lie  in  the  public  museum  at  Cairo.  The  same 
card  contains  the  information  that  she  had  gone  up 
the  Nile  to  the  first  cataract  and  had  seen  Karnak, 
Thebes,  Edfu  and  Philae. 

She  sailed  from  Alexandria  for  Jaffa,  reaching 
Jerusalem  a  few  days  later. 

There  are  no  written  or  published  accounts  of 
her  stay  in  Jerusalem,   though   she  probably  re- 

Page   One   Hundred  Ninety-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

mained  there  two  weeks  or  longer.  Her  impres- 
sions of  the  Holy  City  were  not  at  all  in  consonance 
with  the  sacred  traditions  of  that  locality,  judging 
from  later  references  made  in  lectures  on  the  Turk- 
ish Government.  In  one  of  these  she  declared  that 
her  visit  was  not  at  all  inspirational,  awakening  no 
religious  sentiments.  On  the  contrary,  it  served  to 
emphasize  her  sympathy  with  the  prophetic  apos- 
trophe of  the  Gentle  Teacher,  when  He  exclaimed : 

"Oh,  Jerusalem,  Jerusalem;  how  often  would  I 
have  gathered  thy  children  together,  as  a  hen  doth 
gather  her  brood  under  her  wings,  and  ye  would 
not. 

"Behold,  your  house  is  left  unto  you  desolate; 
and  verily  I  say  unto  you,  ye  shall  not  see  me,  until 
the  time  come  when  ye  shall  say,  Blessed  is  he  that 
cometh  in  the  name  of  the  Lord." 

It  was  Miss  Fielde's  belief  that  nothing  but  the 
forces  of  Christian  enlightenment  and  Christian 
civilization  would  ever  restore  Jerusalem  to  even  a 
comparative  approximation  of  its  former  greatness. 
The  city  has  been  steadily  dying  for  over  two  thou- 
sand years;  until,  at  present,  it  is  absolutely  unfit 
for  human  habitation.  The  people  who  still  live  in 
and  around  the  place  are  either  primitive  or  degen- 
erate. They  are  too  indifferent  to  properly  observe 
the  laws  of  sanitation,  too  indolent  to  wrest  a  liveli- 

Fage  Two  Hundred 


At  Carlsbad 

hood  from  the  soil  and  too  stupid  to  escape  from 
the  country.  There  is  no  possibility  of  the  regen- 
eration of  Jerusalem  except  that  some  Christian 
nation  "gather  her  children  together  as  a  hen  doth 
gather  its  brood.** 

April  20th  she  sent  a  postal  from  Nazareth,  ob- 
viously after  having  left  Jerusalem  en  route  to 
Beirut,  from  whence  she  was  to  sail  for  Constan- 
tinople. This  card  states: 

"Our  party  of  five  Americans,  one  Australian, 
one  Austrian,  one  German  and  two  Scots,  with 
seven  tents,  nineteen  Syrians  and  thirty-two  ani- 
mals, arrived  here  last  evening.  This  morning  we 
have  been  to  see  the  place  of  the  Annunciation, 
Joseph's  workshop,  and  the  town.  During  the  last 
four  days,  since  leaving  Jerusalem,  we  have  been 
to  Bethel,  Rama,  Beeroth,  Shiloh,  Shechem,  Jacob's 
Well,  Ebal,  Samaria,  the  Plains  of  Esdraelon,  Nani, 
Endor,  the  Fountain  of  Gideon,  Shumen  and  the 
Mount  of  the  Transfiguration. 

"We  have  travelled  in  the  paths  trodden  by  the 
prophets;  we  have  viewed  from  the  hilltops  the 
land  traversed  by  the  apostles ;  we  are  among  peo- 
ple who  wear  the  same  attire  and  have  the  same 
characteristics  as  did  the  neighbors  of  Jesus.  Oh, 
the  wild  flowers  of  Palestine !  Great  fields  and  hill- 
sides are  aglow  with  them — mignonette,  larkspur, 
marigolds,  anemones,  scores  of  nameless  beauties, 
all  wild  and  dense.  We  spend  Sunday  here,  tomor- 
row, Tiberius." 

Page  Two  Hundred  One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Six  days  later  the  following  postal  card  an- 
nounces that  she  is  on  the  steamship  "Girond-e," 
bound  for  Constantinople: 

"The  trip  across  from  Jerusalem  to  Beirut  was  a 
severe  one,  but  I  found  it  healthful.  I  enjoyed  a 
canter  on  horseback  the  last  day  of  the  journey 
more  than  I  did  the  first.  Some  days  I  rode  five 
hours  horseback  and  then  travelled  five  more  in  a 
palankeen.  Was  on  Mount  of  Beatitudes,  at  Ti- 
berias, Capernaum,  Bethsaida,  Chorasin,  Dan, 
Caesara  Phillippi  and  the  Sea  of  Galilee.  The 
beauty  of  the  last  has  never  been  justly  described. 
We  are  to  reach  Tripoli  in  Asia  Minor  tomorrow, 
and  the  next  day,  Laodicea,  where  was  one  of  the 
seven  churches  of  Asia.  A  tour  through  this  Holy 
Land  produces  serious  effects  of  some  sort  upon 
one's  faith.  There  seems  to  me  to  be  danger  that 
Christianity  may  become  as  idolatrous  as  pagan- 
ism, and  here  one  sees  as  real  fetich-worship  as  in 
China." 

From  Constantinople,  May  19th,  she  writes: 
"I  am  ever  so  glad  to  be  at  last  in  Europe.  I  have 
lost  many  pounds  of  adipose  in  crossing  Syria;  also 
I  am  tanned  in  spots  to  a  chestnut  brown.  I  ar- 
rived here  on  the  16th,  twenty-four  hours  from 
Smyrna  and  expect  to  stay  here  eight  days  longer; 
then  we  will  go  direct  to  Athens,  136  hours;  after 
which,  to  Carlsbad,  reaching  the  latter  place  about 
the  12th  of  June. 

"I  went  up  to  Tarsus  and  spent  several  hours  at 

Page   Two   Hundred    Two 


At  Carlsbad 

Paul's  birthplace.  It  is  a  dull  and  dirty  little  town. 
I  went  also  to  Ephesus,  and  saw  the  extensive 
ruins  of  what  must  have  been  a  most  magnificent 
city;  with  the  tomb  of  Luke,  the  stone-strewn  site 
of  the  Temple  of  Diana  and  other  relics  of  ages 
agone.  Yesterday  I  met  here  Miss  Bell,  of  Phila- 
delphia, and  other  Americans  with  whom  I  had 
mutual  acquaintances." 

Miss  Fielde  wrote  only  a  short  note  from  Greece 
at  the  time  of  her  visit  to  Athens,  which  refers  only 
to  the  most  casual  sight-seeing.  Later  on,  in  one 
of  her  parlor  lectures,  she  discusses  "Modern  and 
Ancient  Greece;  its  past  and  present  Government," 
in  a  way  that  indicated  that  she  must  have  made  an 
almost  exhaustive  study  of  her  subject  at  some 
time  in  her  life.  The  note  referred  to  contains  only 
the  following: 

"Athens,  Greece,  May  29th,  1890. 

"I  have  been  here  two  days,  and  have  seen  the 
Parthenon,  the  Temple  of  Jupiter  of  Thesus, 
the  place  where  Demosthenes  delivered  orations, 
the  hill  on  which  Paul  preached,  the  mu- 
seums, the  Greek  theater,  of  more  than  two  thou- 
sand years  ago  and  the  Academy  of  the  present 
time.  Dr.  Schliemann  has  three  houses  here,  but 
is  himself  now  on  the  plains  of  Troy.  The  cos- 
tumes of  the  modern  Greeks  are  among  the  most 
attractive  sights:  red  caps  with  a  long  blue  tassel; 
short  jackets  covered  with  embroidery  in  gold 
thread;  fluffy  kilts,  pointed  shoes  and  long  hose." 

Page  Two  Hundred  Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

It  will  be  recalled  that  one  of  Miss  Fielde's  chief 
reasons  for  leaving  China  when  she  did  was  be- 
cause of  poor  health.  For  several  years  she  had 
suffered  from  an  acute  renal  affliction,  from  which 
a  change  of  climate  only  held  any  promise  of  re- 
lief. Before  leaving  the  Orient  she  had  been  re- 
commended to  try  the  waters  of  the  famous  Carls- 
bad springs  as  a  curative  for  her  disorder  and  had 
determined  to  do  so.  From  Athens  she  went  di- 
rectly to  Carlsbad,  Austria,  from  which  place,  un- 
der date  of  June  1  5th,  1 890,  she  writes  interesting- 
ly of  the  town  and  the  course  of  medicinal  treat- 
ment she  is  undergoing: 

"This  is  a  pretty  place;  all  up  hill  and  down  dale; 
with  walks  and  gardens  and  groves,  and  cafes  in 
every  one  of  them.  There  are  fair  green  hills  all 
around,  and  the  brook  Tepl  runs  crookedly  through 
the  valley,  receiving  here  and  there  the  overflow  of 
the  score  of  hot  springs  that  gives  Carlsbad  its 
fame.  The  permanent  inhabitants  of  the  place  are 
about  1 2,00  and  the  visitors  60,000  or  more.  In 
the  morning  from  seven  to  eight  o'clock,  there  are 
crowds  at  the  springs,  each  comer  with  his  cup  and 
napkin,  getting  his  portion  in  the  order  of  arrival. 
There  is  music  somewhere  in  the  gardens  all  day 
long  and  an  opera  house  for  special  concerts,  and 
a  theatre.  All  sorts  and  conditions  of  men  and 
women  are  here,  the  majority  being  Austrian  and 
German.  There  is  little  fashion  and  the  display  of 

Page  Two  Hundred  Four 


At  Carlsbad 

dress  is  chiefly  in  the  shop  windows.  It  takes  most 
of  the  time  to  carry  out  the  doctor's  orders.  My  in- 
dividual regimen  requires  me  to  forego  all  sweets, 
all  starchy  foods,  all  fruits  and  nearly  all  liquids 
except  spring  water.  I  now,  in  the  morning,  take 
three  glasses  of  the  schlossbrun,  at  intervals  of  fif- 
teen minutes,  and  then  walk  an  hour  before  break- 
fast. For  my  breakfast  I  may  have  two  eggs  or  a 
chop,  and  one  roll.  For  my  dinner  I  can  have  (no 
soup)  either  fish  or  roasted  meat,  one  green  vege- 
table, the  crust  of  a  roll  and  a  glass  of  red  wine.  For 
supper  the  same  as  at  breakfast.  As  I  must  exer- 
cise out  of  doors  for  four  hours  a  day,  and  as  I  take 
all  my  meals  in  restaurants,  I  have  not  much  leisure. 
I  have  a  small  room  in  the  topmost  story  of  a  high 
house  on  the  chief  hill.  My  only  acquaintances  as 
yet  are  my  doctor,  in  his  professional  capacity,  my 
banker,  in  his  business  relations,  and  one  American 
lady  who  is  in  the  house,  and  who  has  given  me  the 
modus  operandi  in  Carlsbad,  and  who  will  leave 
here  tomorrow. 

"I  may  be  here  a  month — possibly  longer.  The 
Keen  family,  my  friends  of  1  727  Chestnut  Street, 
Philadelphia,  are  to  be  across  this  summer.  And  I 
have  just  heard  from  Mrs.  O'Connor,  that  she  and 
her  husband  will  sail  for  Europe  on  the  28th  inst. 
All  are  to  be  in  Berlin  for  the  Medical  Congress, 
from  the  fourth  till  the  ninth  of  August.  I  much 
wish  to  be  with  them  then  and  there,  but  am  not 
sure  that  my  doctor  will  think  Berlin  cool  enough 
for  me  in  August.  It  is  deliciously  cold  here.  I 

Page  Two  Hundred  Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

wear  thick  flannels  and  add  my  cloak  o'mornings. 

"You  will  be  glad  to  know  that  Dr.  Kraus  tells 
me  that  I  have  no  organic  disease,  that  my  internal 
organs  are  all  sound,  and  that  the  fault  of  circula- 
tion is  caused  by  too  much  adipose  tissue  solely. 
This  agrees  with  the  diagnosis  of  my  Swatow  doc- 
tor, in  the  main.  I  am  in  every  way  much  stronger 
then  when  I  left  China ;  my  travels  have  been  emi- 
nently healthful,  and  the  trip  across  Syria  reduced 
my  adipose  bravely.  In  fact  I  am  really  very  well 
now,  but  I  thought  it  wise  to  take  the  treatment  for 
adiposis. 

"I  may  remain  in  Europe  for  a  year  to  study.  I 
am  a  bit  homesick,  nevertheless,  and  long  for  my 
America." 

September  7th,  1890,  Miss  Fielde  wrote  from 
Dresden,  assuring  the  recipient  of  her  letter  that 
she  had  fully  recovered  her  health,  thanks  to  the 
waters  of  Carlsbad.  She  expatiates  at  length  on  the 
beauties  of  Dresden,  growing  especially  enthusi- 
astic over  the  painting  of  the  Great  Madonna  of 
that  place. 

"The  crown  and  glory  of  Dresden,"  she  wrote, 
"is  the  Madonna,  which  the  city  has  had  for  two 
hundred  years  and  which  cost  20,000  ducats.  It 
has  a  room  to  itself  in  the  Great  Gallery,  and  I 
have  spent  many  hours  there,  studying  it  and  hu- 
man nature.  Most  persons  unconsciously  behave 
in  that  room  as  if  they  were  in  church.  For  me,  the 
picture  is  the  most  perfect  in  the  world.  Of  course 

Page  Two  Hundred  Six 


At  Carlsbad 

I  cannot  withhold  my  admiration  merely  because 
everyone  else  gives  his;  and  I  am  always  in  such 
subjection  to  that  wonderful  painting,  that  I  could 
cut  off  the  ears  of  anyone  who  adversely  criticises 
it.  And  there  are  persons  who  stand  before  that 
masterpiece  and  find  fault.  Humility  is  a  rare  hu- 
man virtue.  In  fact  I  fear  that  only  a  few  of  us  have 
enough  moral  sense  to  withhold  us  from  express- 
ing opinions  about  things  of  which  we  are  ignorant. 
And  the  Madonna  is  the  ideal  woman,  whose  Son 
is  to  regenerate  the  race." 

In  the  same  letter  she  writes  of  the  superior  mu- 
sical facilities  of  Dresden,  and,  indeed,  all  the  other 
countries  of  Germany,  as  well. 

"I  am  lodging  close  to  the  opera  house,"  she 
says.  "I  suppose  that  the  best  music  in  the  world 
is  now  to  be  heard  in  Germany,  and  that  the  best 
music  in  Germany  may  be  heard  in  the  Hoftheatre 
at  Dresden.  I  have  heard  Tannhauser,  and  Oberon, 
and  Carmen,  and  Aida  and  many  more.  The  set- 
ting upon  the  stage  is  wonderful.  The  other  day 
I  went  with  a  party  of  friends  and  saw  all  the  ma- 
chinery with  the  vast  paraphernalia  and  instruction 
rooms ;  but  I  am  still  unable  to  comprehend  the  per- 
fection of  the  illusions.  The  costumes  are  always 
historically  correct,  and  the  scenes  are  painted  with 
the  scientific  accuracy  of  a  Fellow  of  the  Geographi- 
cal Society.  Here  the  drama  constitutes  almost 
a  liberal  education.  I  am  delighted  because  I  am  to 
do  what  I  have  for  years  wished — to  hear  the  whole 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Cycle  of  the  Nibelungen  Ring.  It  begins  next 
Wednesday  evening  and  will  occupy  four  evenings 
of  four  or  more  hours  each.** 

From  Dresden  Miss  Fielde  went  to  Bavaria  to 
witness  the  performance  of  the  Passion  Play  at 
Oberammergau.  For  weeks  she  had  hesitated 
about  seeing  this  play,  fearing  that  any  attempt  to 
stage  the  "Eternal  Tragedy'*  could  not  otherwise 
than  fail.  She  doubted  if  mortal  talent  could  suc- 
cessfully represent  the  majestic  personality  or  sub- 
lime character  of  Jesus  and  she  shrank  from  expos- 
ing a  cherished  ideal  to  possible  destruction  by  any- 
thing approaching  a  farce. 

But  she  took  the  chance  and  saw  the  play.  She 
was  not  disappointed  but  delighted,  as  many  of  her 
subsequent  letters  and  writings  bear  witness. 


Page  Two  Hundred  Eight 


CHAPTER  EIGHTEEN 

Studying  the  German  Social  System;   In  Berlin; 
Death  of  Mrs.  Davis 

MISS  FIELDE  was  a  great  admirer  of  the  Ger- 
man  system   of  government.      True,   she 
fully  appreciated  and  admitted  the  superi- 
ority of  a  democracy  over  an  autocracy;  but  she 
credited  the  German  people  with  developing,  to  a 
high  degree  of  perfection,  a  primitive  system  of  so- 
cial organization.    In  one  of  her  lectures  she  defined 
the  difference  between  the  German  social  compact 
and  that  of  the  United  States.     "German  paternal- 
ism," she  said,  "makes  society  responsible  for  the 
well-being  of  the  individual;  while  American  dem- 
ocracy holds  the  individual  responsible  for  the  well- 
being  of  society."     In  her  opinion  Socialism,  as  a 
political  ideal,  is  the  natural  evolution  of  imperial- 
ism, and  is  absolutely  alien  to  the  development  of 
a  democracy.     And,  she  is  inclined  to  doubt  if  So- 
cialism would  prove  the  panacea  for  the  ills  of  Ger- 
man autocracy  that  its  protagonists  contend  for  it. 
In  support  of  her  belief  she  uses  the  argument  that 
"the  strength  of  the  German  government  lies  in 
the  fact  that  it  exacts  the  most  rigid  requirements 
of  self-sacrifice,   self-effacement  and  self-negation 
from  the  individual  in  exchange  for  social  protec- 
tion; and  that  the  weakness  of  the  'Socialist*  plan 

Page   Two   Hundred   Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

lies  in  the  demand  for  greatly  increased  benefits 
from  society  without  any  well-defined  reciprocal 
obligation  on  the  part  of  the  individual.  She  was 
also  an  admirer  of  the  efficiency,  thrift,  economy 
and  domesticity  of  the  German  people;  often  ex- 
pressing her  approval  of  their  characteristics  in  her 
public  writings  and  speeches;  but  of  some  of  their 
social  customs  she  is  not  so  well  pleased.  She  evi- 
dently believed  that  many  of  the  social  iniquities  are 
due  to  the  system  of  subordination,  and  official  op- 
pression that  obtains  among  the  German  people. 
In  a  letter  dated  May  1  st,  1 891 ,  she  writes: 

"Germans  are  perennially  interesting.  They  are 
more  like  my  Chinese  than  any  other  Aryan  people 
— but  they  are  unlike  them  in  being  frugal  without 
being  sordid  and  unlike  them  in  possessing  a  won- 
derful ideality  along  with  their  frank  earthliness. 
The  German  women,  on  the  whole,  offer  a  convinc- 
ing argument  against  the  theory  that  when  women 
have  nothing  else  to  do  except  to  make  the  home, 
they*  will  do  that  well.  German  housekeeping  is 
bad;  and  the  numerous  bowlegged  and  weak- 
boned  children  are  each  an  argument  in  favor  of  co- 
education. There  is  also  an  impressive  difference 
in  the  physical  development  of  members  of  differ- 
ent classes  of  Germans  that  is  unlike  anything  I 
have  seen  in  any  other  country.  I  wonder  if  when 
we  Americans  get  a  population  of  fifty  millions  into 
a  space  four  times  as  large  as  the  state  of  New  York, 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ten 


Studying  the  German  System 

and  when  the  struggle  for  life  becomes  such  as  it 
is  in  Germany,  classes  will  be  as  distinctly  separat- 
ed as  they  are  here — and  the  highest  will  be  fair, 
trig  and  spiritual,  while  the  lowest  will  be  stunted, 
flabby  and  unimaginative.  But  Germany  is  safer 
than  the  United  States,  for  she  increases  her  popu- 
lation with  something  like  a  million  of  native  citi- 
zens every  year,  whereas  we  Americans  are  unpro- 
lific,  and  the  worthless  scraps  of  European  nations 
come  in  to  possess  the  land." 

In  October,  1 890,  Miss  Fielde  took  up  her  resi- 
dence in  Berlin  for  the  purpose  of  making  a  study 
of  the  several  and  various  European  governments. 
Here  she  remained  about  nine  months,  making 
daily  visits  to  the  Royal  Library  which  offered  rare 
facilities  for  acquiring  a  knowledge  of  that  branch 
of  science.  At  first  she  was  much  handicapped  by 
her  ignorance  of  the  German  language  but  she  over- 
came this  difficulty  by  taking  two-hour  daily  les- 
sons in  a  three  months'  course  at  the  Berlitz  College 
of  Languages.  In  that  time  she  became  able  to 
read  comprehensively  and  to  write  correctly,  but 
she  never  attained  any  great  proficiency  in  speech. 
In  one  of  her  letters  she  refers  humorously  to  this 
shortcoming:  "German,"  she  said,  "is  spoken  ex- 
clusively at  the  evening  meal;  I  do  not  talk  while 
eating  dinner." 

Not  only  did  she  study  government  while  in  Ber- 

Page   Two   Hundred   Eleven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

lin,  but  other  selected  subjects,  also  devoting  con- 
siderable time  to  desultory  reading.  She  also  sys- 
tematically gave  five  hours  each  week  to  sight-see- 
ing and  to  other  forms  of  amusement.  Of  those 
latter  she  wrote  to  Dr.  Nolan  under  date  of  De- 
cember 25th,  1890: 

"The  museums  here  are  numerous  and  surpass- 
ingly fine,  and  one  should  not  hasten  through  them. 
In  fact  many  of  them,  from  the  Art  to  the  Hy genie 
and  the  Agricultural  even,  are  well  worth  lingering 
over.  And  I  have  been  making  a  special  study  of 
Egypt  in  the  Egyptian  museum  and  the  Royal  Li- 
brary, finding  the  pursuit  almost  as  fascinating  as 
travel  in  that  historic  country  itself. 

"You  see,  I  have  not  that  'familiarity  which 
breeds  contempt*  with  either  museums  or  libraries. 
In  fact  one  of  the  compensations  for  the  outlay  of 
my  years  in  dull  old  China  is  that  I  am  not  a  bit 
blase  in  anything,  and  I  bring  to  all  my  occupations 
in  Europe  a  freshness  of  interest  that  one  who  has 
always  lived  in  the  enlightened  worlds  can  scarcely 
understand. 

**Last  week  I  finished  my  course  of  Egyptian 
study  and  began  to  study  German  at  the  Berlitz 
School  of  Languages.  The  grammar  is  fiendish; 
but  my  disgust  towards  it  is  alleviated  by  my  hav- 
ing a  very  agreeable  teacher  in  the  director  of  the 
school,  who  is  also  a  student  of  Natural  History.  I 
do  not  think  I  shall  ever  learn  to  speak  German.  It 
is  harder  than  Chinese;  and  I  do  not  care  to  take  so 

Page   Two  Hundred   Twelve 


Studying  the  German  System 

much  time  for  what  is  after  all,  not  knowledge  but 
only  a  tool  for  the  acquisition  of  knowledge. 

4 'I  have  seen  the  Emperor  several  times  in  Unter 
den  Linden,  where  royal  equipages  fly  to  and  fro. 
In  the  Reichstag  I  saw  von  Moltke,  who  is  in  his 
ninety-first  year.  He  looks  no  more  than  seventy. 
A  few  evenings  ago  I  saw  Bismarck  for  about  five 
minutes,  while  the  train  on  which  he  was  traveling 
stopped  at  a  station.  The  crowd  constantly  cheer- 
ed him  as  he  leaned  out  of  the  car  window  and  shook 
hands  with  his  Berliners.  His  hair,  eyebrows  and 
moustaches  are  snowy  white,  but  he  is  as  straight 
and  sturdy  as  an  oak.*' 

The  program  of  travel  which  Miss  Fielde  ar- 
ranged for  herself,  provided  for  her  departure  from 
Berlin  the  latter  part  of  April  and  a  visit  to  Russia. 
But  at  this  time  her  plans  were  varied  by  the  illness 
and  subsequent  death  of  her  friend  and  traveling 
companion,  Mrs.  Davis,  causing  her  to  remain  two 
weeks  or  longer  at  the  Prussian  capital.  In  a  letter 
to  one  of  her  correspondents  in  America,  she  tells 
of  this  latter  occurrence,  expressing  her  consequent 
depression  of  spirits  from  which  she  suffered  keen- 
ly. On  May  1  1  th,  1 89 1 ,  she  wrote : 

"I  have  in  my  former  letters  mentioned  Mrs. 
Davis,  whom  I  first  met  in  Bombay,  who  was  of  our 
party  all  the  way  from  there,  up  the  Nile,  through 
Syria,  in  the  Levant  and  on  to  Greece.  Later  she 
was  with  me  in  Dresden  and  we  came  here  togeth- 
er. For  some  months  she  occupied  a  room  next 

Page  Two  Hundred  Thirteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

mine  while  we  were  sight-seeing  in  Berlin.  We 
then  planned  a  spring  and  summer  tour  together, 
and  had  extended  our  thoughts  over  a  whole  year, 
and  a  return  at  the  same  time  to  our  America.  Well, 
on  the  first  she  returned  here  from  Paris,  and  we 
thought  we  had  one  week  in  which  to  get  ready 
for  our  projected  three  months'  journey  in  Russia, 
Denmark,  Sweden  and  Norway.  The  day  after  her 
arrival  she  was  taken  ill  with  what  proved  to  be 
pneumonia,  and  last  Friday,  the  day  on  which  we 
thought  to  have  started  for  Warsaw,  she  departed 
on  another  journey  and  will  no  more  come  back  to 
me.  I  was  almost  constantly  by  her  bedside;  and 
after  her  body  was  embalmed  it  was  today  encoffin- 
ed  and  carried  out  from  her  former  room,  later  to 
be  taken  to  New  York.  Mrs.  Harper,  of  the  Harp- 
er Bros.'  Harper  and  Mrs.  Dalton,  wife  of  the  well- 
known  publisher,  are  her  sisters.  She  was  a  trus- 
tee of  Boston  University,  and  was  well  known  in 
her  circle  for  her  loving  kindness.  I  have  seen  her 
in  the  trying  positions  into  which  the  exigencies  of 
travel  often  bring  people,  and  have  had  ample  op- 
portunity to  discover  her  defects,  but  never  for  a 
moment  have  I  seen  her  as  other  than  a  true  lady 
and  a  true  Christian.  Her  death  has  left  me  feeling 
like  jetsam,  around  which  the  waves  roar  and  clouds 
roll.  I  have  liked  Berlin  much  until  now.  It  is 
usually  a  place  where  one  can  find  countless  de- 
lights, social,  intellectual,  and  distractive.  But  now 
I  have  given  up  all  my  winter's  occupations,  studies, 
duties  and  pleasures,  and  I  cannot  think  of  resum- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fourteen 


Studying  the  German  System 

ing  any  of  them.  I  think  I  shall  start  in  three  or 
four  days  either  for  Moscow  or  Copenhagen.  The 
expenditure  for  a  lone  Russian  journey  is  for  me 
really  a  reckless  one,  but  I  have  the  plans  all  studied 
up ;  and  just  now  I  can't  succeed  in  feeling  interest- 
ed in  doing  anything  whatever  except  that  which  I 
had  expected  to  do  along  with  my  friend.'* 


Page  Two   Hundred  Fifteen 


CHAPTER  NINETEEN 

Travel  in  Russia;  Jew-baiting;  Invoking  Aid  From 

America 

MAY   14th,   1891,  Miss  Fielde  reached  Mos- 
cow, the  ancient  capital  of  Russia.     At  the 
time  of  her  arrival  one  of  the  periodical 
epidemics  of  Jew-baiting  had  broken  out  in  the  city 
as  well  as  in  several  other  parts  of  the  Empire.     An 
imperial  edict  had  been  previously  issued  expelling 
all  the  people  of  Hebrew  origin  and  religion  from 
that  section  of  the  country  designated  as  Great 
Russia. 

Here  she  witnessed  scenes  of  cruelty  exceeding 
in  horror  anything  ever  before  enacted  in  a  civiliz- 
ed country  since  the  Middle  Ages,  Here  she  found 
thousands  of  Jews,  many  of  them  helpless  women 
and  children,  many  of  them  feeble  from  old  age  and 
many  of  them  lying  on  the  bare  ground,  too  ill  to 
stand  on  their  feet,  all  herded  together  in  a  cattle- 
pen  where  they  had  waited  days  without  food  or 
shelter  for  trains  to  transport  them  to  a  distant 
country.  As  usual  the  "Christian'*  officers,  who 
were  gladly  enforcing  the  merciless  edict,  had 
sought  to  excuse  their  conduct  by  charging  their 
helpless  victims  with  a  variety  of  offenses  against 
the  State  religion,  but  no  trial  at  law  had  taken  place 

Fage   Two   Hundred   Sixteen 


Travel  in  Russia 

to  determine  the  guilt  or  innocence  of  the  accused. 

Miss  Fielde  remained  a  month  in  Moscow, 
spending  the  whole  of  that  time  in  investigating 
and  studying  the  Jewish  problem  in  Russia.  Two 
months  later  she  published  accounts  of  her  obser- 
vations and  conclusions  in  a  number  of  leading 
newspapers  and  magazines  in  the  United  States, 
causing  considerable  of  an  uproar  among  the  Jew- 
ish citizens  of  the  Republic. 

At  the  thirteenth  annual  convention  of  the  Jew- 
ish Ministers'  Association,  held  in  New  York,  June 
1 6th,  1 89 1 ,  Miss  Fielde's  articles  were  read  and 
discussed.  As  a  result  the  convention  raised  a  huge 
sum  of  money  for  the  relief  of  their  distressed  co- 
religionists and  also  strongly  petitioned  President 
Harrison  to  exert  the  influence  of  the  United  States 
Government  against  further  repetition  of  these  ter- 
rible outrages.  Subsequently,  Seer etary-of -State 
Elaine  took  up  the  matter  with  the  Russian  Gov- 
ernment in  a  diplomatic  communication.  In  reply, 
the  Czar  gave  personal  assurances  that  thereafter 
the  Jews  of  Russia  should  receive  the  same  treat- 
ment as  his  other  subjects.  The  Jews  of  Russia 
were  never  again  persecuted  by  imperial  proclam- 
ation. True,  they  were  often  cruelly  wronged  as 
individuals  by  the  lesser  sources  of  authority,  and, 
occasionally,  whole  communities  were  made  to  suf- 

Page  Two   Hundred   Seventeen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

fer  because  of  the  religious  prejudice  of  the  popu- 
lace; but,  on  the  whole,  the  conditions  of  the  Jews 
were  greatly  improved  from  that  time  on. 

It  is  not  the  intention  of  the  writer  hereof  to  rep- 
resent Miss  Fielde  as  the  sole  instrument  of  Provi- 
dence by  which  the  Russian  Jews  secured  immunity 
from  the  official  mistreatment  which  had  formerly 
oppressed  them,  for  such  is  not  true.  Mr.  George 
Kennan  and  other  notable  travelers  had  devoted 
years  of  labor,  both  by  public  writings  and  lectures, 
to  the  task  of  turning  world-wide  public  sentiment 
against  the  cruelties  practiced  by  the  Russian  of- 
ficials upon  the  Jews.  She  simply  happened  to  pub- 
lish the  articles  that  inspired  the  Ministerial  Associa- 
tion to  take  the  action  they  did  at  an  opportune  mo- 
ment. One  of  her  articles  regarding  the  Russian 
persecution  is  here  reproduced  from  the  New  York 
Times: 

"Late  in  the  winter,  before  the  imperial  edict  of 
the  9th  of  March  was  issued,  it  was  known  that  the 
Jews  were  to  be  expelled  from  Great  Russia,  and 
the  police  began  their  usual  visitations  to  Jewish 
dwellings.  When  this  edict  was'  published,  just  at 
the  Passover,  the  Jews  had  for  twenty-five  years 
and  one  day,  possessed,  unconditionally,  certain 
privileges  which  had  been  suddenly  withdrawn. 
The  father  of  the  present  Czar  permitted  Jews  who 
were  competent  artisans,  Jews  who  had  attained  a 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighteen 


Travel  in  Russia 

certain  degree  of  scholarship  in  the  Russian  schools, 
the  children  of  Jewish  soldiers  who  had  served 
twenty-five  years  in  the  Russian  army,  and  also 
some  other  peculiarly  serviceable  classes  to  dwell 
in  Great  Russia.  Before  that  time  all  the  Jews 
were  crowded  into  certain  western  and  southern 
provinces,  and  were  not  allowed  to  enter  Great 
Russia. 

"So  intelligently  had  the  Jews  taken  advantage 
of  the  political  opportunity  for  education  and  for 
the  exercise  of  handicrafts  that  they  had  become 
leaders  in  Russian  progress.  Their  present  perse- 
cution does  not  originate  among  the  common  peo- 
ple, who  live  very  amicably  with  the  Jews,  but  is 
incited  by  the  Government. 

"Since  the  Czar  escaped  assassination  two  years 
ago  he  has  considered  himself  to  have  been  especi- 
ally preserved  for  the  defense  of  the  Russian-Greek 
church  and  the  annihilation  of  heretics.  The  intol- 
erance of  the  old  Spanish  Inquisition  marks  the  im- 
perial decrees  and  discourages  all  dissent.  As  edu- 
cation undermines  that  peculiar  form  of  heathen- 
ism called  the  Greek  Faith,  education  for  the  masses 
is  now  discountenanced.  The  Jews  especially  may 
not  be  more  than  three  per  cent,  of  the  pupils  in 
any  particular  school,  and,  as  the  four  or  five  mil- 
lion of  Jews  in  Russia  are  permitted  to  live  only  in 
certain  cities,  they  there  form  so  large  a  proportion 
of  the  population  that  their  education  in  the  public 
schools  becomes  impossible.  In  the  provincial 

Page   Two   Hundred  Nineteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

cities  where  they  are  allowed  to  live  there  is  not  a 
single  high  school. 

"There  are,  in  fact,  today  no  less  than  635  laws 
directed  especially  against  the  Jews,  and  besides 
these,  are  several  thousand  regulations  affecting 
this  people  adversely. 

"While  they  are  deprived  of  the  privileges,  they 
must  perform  the  duties  of  Russian  subjects,  and 
must  serve  in  the  army,  pay  taxes,  and  remain  in 
Russia.  Even  to  advise  a  Jew  to  emigrate  is  itself 
a  punishable  political  offense.  Under  the  Russian 
autocracy,  everything  and  anything  is  criminal,  ac- 
cording to  the  mood  of  the  Czar,  expressed  through 
the  omniscient  and  omnipotent  police.  During  the 
last  few  weeks  the  expulsion  of  the  Jews  from  Mos- 
cow has  been  carried  on  with  cruelty.  Houses 
where  Jews  are  supposed  to  lodge  are,  between 
midnight  and  dawn,  surrounded,  and  rooms  where 
women  and  children  are  sleeping  are  entered  and 
carefully  searched.  Every  Jew,  of  either  sex  and 
of  any  age,  who  is  unable  to  show  an  official  writ- 
ten permit  to  live  in  Moscow  is  hauled  away  in 
fetters. 

"A  few  days  ago  a  house  was  thus  surrounded, 
and  in  a  family  of  nine  was  found  a  boy  of  eleven, 
born  in  Moscow,  whose  name  was  not  written  in 
his  father's  permission  for  residence.  The  boy  was 
taken  to  prison.  The  father  appealed  to  an  offi- 
cial for  his  release  on  the  ground  that  the  oversight 
in  getting  a  permission  for  residence  for  him  was 
not  his  own  and  that  he  would  receive  great  moral 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty 


Travel  in  Russia 


injury  by  association  with  adult  criminals,  but  this 
appeal  was  roughly  disregarded. 

"In  Russia  the  law  is  less  considered  than  is  its 
latest  interpretation,  and  now  even  those  who  have 
permission  papers  of  recent  date  are  often  warned 
to  leave  the  city  within  a  day.  This  forces  the  Jews 
to  depart  with  business  unsettled  and  debts  uncol- 
lected,  and  often  unscrupulous  Russians  take  ad- 
vantage of  the  opportunity  to  get  the  property  of 
the  victims  at  a  fraction  of  its  value. 

"About  half  of  the  Jewish  residents  of  Moscow 
have  been  expelled  within  six  weeks.  Eight  thou- 
sand have  gone  out,  and  many  are  daily  departing 
towards  the  Jewish  quarters  of  the  few  cities  where 
they  are  permitted  to  live.  Within  a  few  days  I 

myself   have   talked   with    many    of    the    fugitive 

Jtt 
ews. 

Miss  Fielde  did  not  mail  her  manuscript  contain- 
ing the  account  of  the  expulsion  of  the  Jews  in  Rus- 
sia, but  wisely  waited  until  she  reached  Stockholm. 
She  knew  of  the  Russian  censorship  and  of  the 
Russian  disregard  for  the  comfort  and  life  of  the 
ordinary  human  being,  whether  a  subject  of  the 
"Holy  Empire*'  or  a  visiting  stranger.  She  also 
knew  that  she,  probably,  would  be  made  to  quietly 
"disappear"  should  the  postal  authorities  learn  of 
her  intention  to  publish  the  story  of  the  awful  per- 
secutions. 

She  reached  Stockholm  June  5th  and  remained 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

in  Sweden  about  two  weeks.  She  found  the  capital 
city  a  charming  place,  greatly  enjoying  her  visit 
while  there.  From  her  chamber  in  the  Belleview 
Hotel  she  could  look  upon  a  colossal  statue  of  Gus- 
tavus  Adolphus,  the  northern  facade  of  King 
Oscar's  castle  and  a  lovely  parterre,  where,  in  "the 
long  twilight,  hundreds  of  Stockholmers  hear  mu- 
sic and  drink  chocolate." 

A  postal  card,  written  by  Miss  Fielde  from  Cop- 
enhagen, dated  June  18th,  describes  that  place  as 
a  city  of  many  beautiful  parks,  where  "nightingales 
sing  and  troops  of  yellow-haired  children  with  eyes 
fiercely  blue  chase  squirrels." 

Kristiania,  she  considers  the  hottest  place  in  Eu- 
rope, but  lingered  there  a  week  because  of  her  in- 
terest in  the  relics  of  the  Norsemen.  On  July  5th 
she  went  to  Hammer fest,  the  most  northern  town  in 
Europe.  Here  she  saw  the  midnight  sun  and  spent 
several  hours  at  a  Lapp  encampment.  She  remain- 
ed a  month  in  Norway,  writing  entertaining  letters 
of  fjords,  snow-capped  peaks,  rushing  waterfalls 
and  picturesque  costumes.  August  1  st,  1 89 1 ,  she 
wrote  from  Amsterdam,  saying  that  she  had  spent 
four  days  at  the  Hague,  one  at  Leyden  and  she 
would  probably  stay  where  she  was  for  a  week 
longer.  She  considered  Holland  a  land  of  surpass- 
ing wealth  and  indefatigable  industry.  "Every- 

Page   Two  Hundred   Twenty-Two 


Travel  in  Russia 

where,"  she  wrote,  "are  endless  great  plains  with 
herds  of  spotted  cattle,  canals  reflecting  like  mirrors 
their  willowly  banks,  windmills  galore,  long  lines 
of  dark  trees,  quaint  towns  and  villages." 

From  Holland  she  visited  Antwerp  and  Brussels. 
Antwerp,  she  thought  remarkable  for  its  museum 
of  natural  history.  She  was  especially  interested  in 
the  exhibits  of  anthropology,  demonstrating  as 
they,  perhaps,  did  several  stages  in  the  evolutionary 
progress  of  man  after  his  emergence  from  the  pithe- 
canthropian  primates.  At  Brussels  she  went  sight- 
seeing to  Waterloo,  and  picked  a  flower  from  that 
blood-fertilized  battlefield. 

She  found  Switzerland  a  country  of  high  moun- 
tains, fertile  valleys  and  independent  people.  Here 
she  spent  six  weeks,  principally  at  Zurich  and 
Berne,  studying  the  principles  of  the  Initiative,  Ref- 
erendum, Recall  and  Imperative  Mandate,  and  mak- 
ing inquiries  as  to  the  practical  operation  of  those 
laws.  At  that  time  direct  legislation  in  the  Alpine 
country  had  long  passed  the  experimental  stage. 
Miss  Fielde's  comments  on  the  Swiss  government 
would  indicate  that  she  regarded  it  as  the  most  ad- 
vanced in  democracy  of  any  other  nation.  Twenty 
years  later  she  used  the  knowledge  she  gained  in 
Switzerland  to  good  advantage  fighting  for  direct 
legislation  in  the  State  of  Washington. 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty-Three 


CHAPTER  TWENTY 

Travels  in  France,  Spain,  Italy  and  Algiers 

IN  a  letter  from  Paris  dated  December  2 1  st,  1 89 1 , 
Miss  Fielde  wrote: 

* 'I  enclose  a  sheet  concerning  the  board- 
ing house  at  which  I  am  staying.  It  may  encourage 
you  to  put  up  here  when  you  come.  The  clientele, 
of  course,  is  constantly  changing ;  but  of  those  who 
are  older  inhabitants  than  I,  there  is  an  ancient 
French  countess  with  the  charming  manners  of  the 
old  noblesse,  a  great  variety  of  lace  caps  and  the 
prettiest  mode  of  salutation  in  Paris.  She  is  the 
author  of  a  volume  of  sad  poems,  a  staunch  Catho- 
lic, and  a  Royalist.  She  bears  her  fallen  fortunes 
and  the  loss  of  all  her  kin  with  a  fortitude  that 
makes  her  nobility  seem  very  real. 

"Then  there  is  a  Persian  general,  a  brother  of  the 
Shah's  ambassador  to  the  court  of  St.  James,  Prince 
Khan.  In  spite  of  his  hairless  pate,  red  nose,  stony 
black  eyes,  and  the  ever  hidden  probability  that  he 
owns  a  harem  in  Teheran,  he  is  a  very  agreeable 
and  courteous  fellow-boarder.  We  also  have  a 
youngish  child  of  Israel,  born  of  a  German  father 
and  French  mother,  in  America,  and  possessing  the 
advantage  of  being  able  to  speak  three  languages 
like  a  native  of  three  countries.  He  is  chatty  and 
right-hearted  and  when  he  comes  down  to  break- 
fast all  perfumed,  he  is  the  sweetest  smelling  of  his 
tribe.  There  are  also  about  twenty  in  the  house 
and  as  most  of  the  comers  stay  long  enough  to  be- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty-Four 


Travels  in  France,  Spain,  Italy  and  Algiers 

come  acquaintances,  the  life  in  pension  is  rather  in- 
teresting. 

"I  have  studied  Spanish,  three  lessons  a  week 
for  one  month,  and  am  now  able  to  give  orders  to 
cab-drivers  and  chamber-maids  in  that  tongue.  Also 
I  spend  many  of  my  mornings  rubbing  up  my 
French,  and  all  the  afternoons  sight-seeing.  Lately 
I  heard  Pere  Hyacinth  on  the  'Separation  of  Church 
and  State' — a  question  which  is  now  rending  the 
Chamber  of  Deputies.  Last  Saturday  I  went  to 
hear  Renan,  president  of  the  College  of  France  and 
author  of  'The  Life  of  Jesus,'  but  the  hall  was  so 
crowded  before  I  reached  it,  that  I  could  not  find 
even  standing  room.  All  the  lectures  of  the  Sar- 
bonne  and  the  College  de  France  are  free  and  open 
to  women  as  well  as  to  men.  In  fact  all  the  great 
galleries,  museums,  and  about  everything  that  one 
goes  to  see  in  Paris,  are  open  every  day  and  can  be 
visited  without  cost  to  the  sight-seeker. 

"I  have  heard  Lohengrin  and  Faust  at  the  Grand 
Opera,  and  saw  the  Taming  of  the  Shrew  played 
with  Coquelin  as  Petruchio  at  the  Theatre  Francais. 
Paris  is  inexhaustible  in  its  resources  for  pleasure 
and  instruction.  The  grave  as  well  as  the  gay  may 
invest  months  here  with  profit.  The  winter  weath- 
er has  been  unvaryingly  bad.  The  best  that  I  can 
say  of  it  is  that  there  has  been  neither  an  earth- 
quake nor  a  typhoon. 

"Miss  Florence  Keen,  daughter  of  Dr.  Keen  of 
Philadelphia,  joined  me  here  the  middle  of  Novem- 
ber, and  has  since  beeen  studying  music  in  the 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

mornings  and  sight-seeing  with  me  afternoons. 
We  are  to  start  for  Italy  on  the  4th  of  January,  go- 
ing first  to  Turin,  then  to  Milan,  Verona,  Venice, 
Bologna,  Ravenna,  Florence,  Rome,  Naples,  Sorren- 
to, Capri,  Vesuvius,  Pompeii,  Herculaneum,  Pisa, 
Genoa  and  Nice.  We  shall  probably  spend  two 
months  in  Italy,  giving  about  a  week  to  Venice,  ten 
days  to  Florence,  two  weeks  to  Rome,  eight  days 
to  Naples  and  its  environs,  and  a  day  or  two  to  the 
lesser  places  named.  We  expect  to  return  along 
through  the  Riviera  and  reach  Barcelona  early  in 
March,  to  make  the  tour  of  Spain  in  its  lovely  spring 
weather.  Our  route  is  to  be  from  Barcelona,  to  Tar- 
ragona, Valencia,  Seville,  Cadiz,  Granada,  Malaga, 
Cordova,  Oporto,  Lisbon,  Caceres,  Madrid,  Toledo, 
Escorial,  Avila,  Salamanca,  Valladolid,  Burgos,  Bil- 
bao, St.  Sebastian,  Bordeaux,  Tours,  and  so  back  to 
Paris,  so  as  to  reach  here  early  in  May.  It  may  be 
that  we  will  cross  to  Tangier  from  Southern  Spain, 
and  that  we  will  also  take  in  Gibraltar.  Spain  and 
Portugal  will  complete  my  tour  of  Europe,  as  I 
shall  then  have  visited  all  its  countries,  and  have 
seen  all  its  capitals.  I  havQ  been  reading  Irving's 
works  and  am  eager  to  compare  the  buildings  of 
the  Moors  in  Spain  with  the  superb  creations  of 
their  co-religionists  in  India.  I  doubt  if  the  Alham- 
bra  equals  the  palace  of  Akbar.  It  is  said  that  the 
galleries  of  Madrid  contain  more  gems  than  any 
other  collection  in  the  world;  that  the  scenery  of 
Southern  Spain  rivals  that  of  Switzerland  and  Nor- 
way; that  all  over  the  peninsula  the  traveler  is  en- 
rage Two  Hundred  Twenty-Six 


Travels  in  France,  Spain,  Italy  and  Algiers 

raptured  by  picturesque  costumes  and  curious  cus- 
toms. Therefore  I  am  expecting  great  delight  in 
Spain.  I  have  a  vivid  remembrance  of  Italy.  All 
my  life  has  been  richer  and  sweeter  because  of  my 
having  spent  six  weeks  there  years  ago.  I  am  de- 
lighted to  go  again,  and  with  so  eager  and  bright 
a  traveller  as  is  Miss  Keen.  Her  enjoyment  of  all 
that  happens  doubles  my  own." 

A  note  in  Miss  Fielde's  diary,  written  at  Venice 
and  dated  January  1 4th,  states  that  she  spent  a  day 
at  Verona  and  saw  the  ancient  home  and  tomb  of 
Juliet;  also  she  met  many  handsome  live  Romeos, 
who  apparently  had  no  other  occupation  than  that 
of  singing  under  balconies.  She  expressed  the 
thought  that  the  great  amphitheatre  of  that  city  is 
in  a  better  state  of  preservation  than  the  Coliseum 
at  Rome.  The  seats,  capable  of  holding  twenty 
thousand  spectators,  are  still  intact,  and  the  cells, 
where  the  Christian  martyrs  were  confined  while 
waiting  on  the  appetites  of  the  wild  beasts,  are  still 
strong  enough  to  serve  that  purpose  today.  She 
also  wrote  that  she  and  Miss  Keen  had  about 
"done"  Venice.  They  had  lingered  long  in  the  be- 
loved St.  Mark's,  been  through  the  palaces  of  the 
Doges;  the  ancient  prisons;  across  the  Bridge  of 
Sighs;  to  several  glass  factories;  along  the  Grand 
Canal,  beauteous  in  bank  and  vista ;  to  the  tomb  of 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Titian ;  to  the  best  picture  galleries  and  had  repeat- 
edly fed  the  pigeons  on  the  Piazzetta. 

Soon  after  another  note  states  that  *'we  went 
over  to  Ravenna,  where  St.  Appolinaris,  a  disciple 
of  St.  Peter,  preached  in  the  year  44;  to  Dante's 
tomb  and  to  the  mausoleum  of  Theodoric  the  Ostra- 
goth  and  to  the  burial  place  of  Americus  Vespucius. 

February  5th  she  spent  five  hours  at  Pompeii 
among  the  roofless  dwellings  and  silent  streets. 
While  there  she  and  her  companion  saw  a  fine  fresco 
that  had  been  buried  eighteen  hundred  j'ears  exca- 
vated. It  seemed  as  bright  as  if  newly  painted.  She 
also  saw  the  bread  that  was  baking  in  an  oven  when 
Vesuvius  overthrew  the  bakery;  the  box  where  a 
sentinel  remained  at  his  post  until  buried  by  the 
falling  ashes;  the  skeleton  of  an  old  woman  lying 
on  a  bed  from  which  she  was  too  weak  to  flee;  the 
manacles  which  held  prisoners  for  an  unexpected 
doom.  On  February  9th  she  made  an  entry  in  her 
diary  at  Naples,  to  the  effect  tfiat  she  had  been  up 
Vesuvius;  spent  a  day  at  Pompeii;  visited  the  per- 
fect Greek  temple,  where  it  stood  superb  and 
desolate  at  twenty-four  hundred  years  of  age; 
drove  from  Salerno  to  Amalfi,  and  lunched  in  the 
old  Capuchin  monastery  that  is  perched  like  a  dove- 
cote on  the  cliffs  over  the  blue  Mediterranean; 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty-Eight 


Travels  in  France,  Spain,  Italy  and  Algiers 

went  to  Sorrento  and  to  Capri,  the  latter  being  the 
beloved  of  artists;  entered  successfully  by  lying 
down  in  a  little  boat,  the  weird  Blue  Grotto,  and 
encouraged  an  elf  to  catch  cold  by  swimming  in 
the  azure  waters  for  a  half-franc. 

Of  Rome,  she  makes  this  comment,  dated  Feb- 
ruary 22nd,  1892:  "I  think  there  is  no  city  so  per- 
manently captivating  as  Rome.  The  tremendous 
ruins,  especially  when  illumined  by  the  lectures  of 
the  fiery  archeologist,  Spadoni,  are  utterly  fascinat- 
ing. The  endless  galleries  of  ancient  statuary,  the 
four  hundred  churches,  each  with  a  history,  and 
with  special  magnificence  of  some  sort;  the  charm- 
ing aged  fountains,  the  countless  romance-breeding 
palaces,  are  each  a  tie  to  the  Eternal  City.  And 
I  have  seen  beautiful  Queen  Margaret.  Tonight 
the  Coliseum  is  to  be  electrically  lighted.  There  is 
nothing  so  enticing  as  living  in  Rome.'* 

The  next  entry  in  the  diary  was  made  at  Tangier, 
Morocco,  April  1  st.  Here  she  says,  "We  came 
from  Cadiz,  a  six  hours  sail  across  to  this  queer 
corner  of  the  Dark  continent.  The  chief  inhabit- 
ants are  swarthy  Moors,  wiry  Jews  and  weird  Berb- 
ers from  the  Atlas  mountains.  The  Oriental  aspect 
of  affairs  make  the  place  well  worth  seeing  and 
draws  about  fourteen  hundred  tourists  across  the 
straits  every  year.  Yesterday  we  went  to  the  Ba- 
shaw's harem;  saw  a  snake-charmer;  gathered 
flowers  in  an  orange  grove;  rode  on  donkeys  to  a 

Page  Two  Hundred  Twenty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 


hill-top;  and  spent  several  hours  in  the  Great  Mar- 
ket, where  hundreds  of  ghostly  figures  in  long, 
peaked-hoods,  woolen  brown  and  white  shirts  were 
dealing  in  the  products  of  the  land." 

From  Hotel  Washington  Irving,  Granada,  April 
9th,  1892,  Miss  Fielde  wrote:  "I  have  never  seen 
a  city  which,  omitting  all  social  ties,  bound  one's 
heart  as  does  this  scenery.  Stately  in  its  grandeur, 
beautiful  in  its  towers  and  surroundings,  its  ro- 
mances, legends,  traditions  casting  a  glamour  into 
all  its  nooks.  Art,  exquisite  as  only  the  Moorish 
can  be,  fascinating  the  eye  and  soul.  We  have  seen 
the  casket  from  which  'our*  Queen  Isabella  sold 
her  jewels  in  order  to  provide  money  for  the  dis- 
covery of  America;  the  hall  in  which  the  royal 
sanction  was  given  Columbus;  have  laid  a  kiss  on 
the  iron-plated  coffin  of  the  noble  woman  whose 
broadmindedness  gave  us  national  existence.  Have 
had  six  bright  days  and  moonlit  nights  in  which  to 
haunt  the  Alhambra.  Only  a  volume  written  by  a 
poet-artist  could  properly  describe  it." 

Escorial,  she  did  not  find  sq  bright  and  interest- 
ing. On  the  1  Oth  of  May,  she  wrote:  "Yesterday 
I  went  through  the  vast  granite  edifice  built  by 
Philip  II.,  containing  a  seminary,  a  monastery,  a 
palace,  a  library,  a  picture  gallery,  a  church,  a  mau- 
soleum and  many  spacious  courts;  each  expressive 
of  something  in  the  character  of  that  moody  mon- 
arch, who  chose  for  his  patron-saint  the  cannon- 
ized  Lawrence,  who  ended  his  days  by  being  fried 

Page  Two  Hundred  Thirty 


Travels  in  France,  Spain,  Italy  and  Algiers 

on  a  gridiron  after  he  had  fried  tens  of  thousands 
of  other  saints  because  they  differed  with  him  in 
theology.  There  is  the  sternly  simple  room  where 
he  received  ambassadors,  the  chairs  on  which  he 
rested  his  gouty  legs,  the  oratorio,  where  he  expired 
while  hearing  High  Mass,  his  coffin  and  the  tombs 
of  his  four  wives.  There  are  here  most  interesting 
portraits  of  that  terrible  trio,  Philip,  Torquemada 
and  the  Duke  of  Alva,  who  form  together  so  sali- 
ent a  point  in  the  history  of  ecclesiastical  bigotry." 

From  Spain,  Miss  Fielde  went  to  Vienna,  thence 
to  Eisenach  and  on  to  Dresden,  remaining  a  week 
or  more  at  each  place.  June  2nd,  she  returned  to 
Paris,  where  she  remained  until  September  27th, 
when  she  sailed  for  the  United  States.  It  was  a  lit- 
tle more  than  two  years  from  the  time  she  left  Swa- 
tow,  China,  until  she  arrived  in  New  York,  October 
12th,  1892. 


Page  Two  Hundred  Thirty-One 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-ONE 

Return  to  America;  Dra wing-Room  Lectures 

ON  arriving  at  New  York  Miss  Fielde  found 
that  she  must  engage  in  some  gainful  occu- 
ation.  To  use  her  own  words,  she  must  do 
something  to  supplement  the  small  fixed  income- — 
the  semi-annual  interest  on  an  annuity  purchased 
with  the  savings  accumulated  while  in  the  mission- 
ary service.  At  first  she  had  an  idea  of  writing  for 
newspapers  and  magazines,  but  was  persuaded 
from  so  doing  by  her  friend,  Mrs.  W.  A.  Cauldwell, 
who  advised  her  to  enter  the  lecture  field  instead. 
Mrs.  Cauldwell  had  been  greatly  impressed  by  Miss 
Fielde's  success  as  a  lecturer  while  under  the  aus- 
pices of  the  Baptist  Foreign  Missionary  Society 
twelve  years  previously.  She  remembered  the  in- 
tense interest  manifested  by  the  large  audiences  that 
had  heard  Miss  Fielde  relate  her  experiences  as  a 
missionary  worker  in  the  Orient,  and  the  fact  that 
her  gifted  friend  had  been  the  instrument  by  which 
large  sums  of  money  had  been  raised  for  mission- 
ary purposes  had  not  escaped  her.  It  was  her  be- 
lief that  Miss  Fielde  could  achieve  the  same  material 
results  if  she  applied  her  efforts  for  her  own  per- 
sonal benefit.  So  the  two  women  resolved  to  make 
the  experiment.  They  planned  to  adopt  the  same 

Page   Two  Hundred   Thirty-Two 


Return  to  America 

program  of  arrangements  that  they  had  followed 
in  the  church  lectures,  except  that  private  drawing 
rooms  were  to  be  used  instead  of  church  edifices 
and  a  fixed  price  of  admission  was  agreed  on  in- 
stead of  relying  upon  voluntary  donations. 

Mrs.  Cauldwell  launched  the  enterprise  by  issu- 
ing six  hundred  invitations  requesting  her  friends 
and  acquaintances  to  meet  at  her  home,  in  the  af- 
ternoon of  January  6th,  1893,  to  hear  Miss  Fielde 
discuss  Chinese  Civilization  and  kindred  topics. 
The  affair  proved  a  tremendous  success.  Mrs. 
Cauldwell's  commodious  dwelling  was  filled  to 
overflowing.  The  'guests  were  evidently  highly 
pleased,  as,  at  the  close  of  the  entertainment,  Miss 
Fielde  received  so  many  invitations  to  repeat  her 
talk  or  make  others  and  so  many  of  her  auditors 
offered  the  use  of  their  homes  for  that  purpose, 
that  it  required  three  months  at  the  rate  of  three  lec- 
tures a  week  to  fill  the  engagements  booked  on  this 
occasion. 

From  that  time  on  for  the  next  thirteen  years, 
Miss  Fielde  was  steadily  employed  as  a  lecturer, 
teacher  and  publicist.  She  began  as  an  entertainer 
at  the  homes  of  the  wealthy,  cultured  class  of  New 
York  society,  but  as  her  reputation  grew,  she  ex- 
tended her  field  of  operations  so  that  they  included 
regular  appearances  before  several  scientific  socie- 

Pagre  Two  Hundred  Thirty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ties,  numerous  religious  and  philosophic  assem- 
blages and  many  civic  and  political  organizations. 
Before  many  weeks  as  a  lecturer,  she  found 
that  she  must  vary  her  program  of  subjects.  While, 
perhaps,  she  was  better  informed  on  matters  per- 
taining to  the  Orient  and  Chinese  life,  the  time 
came  when  those  topics  failed  to  interest  her  more 
regular  auditors.  In  the  several  voluminous  scrap- 
books  and  diaries,  which  she  kept  and  faithfully 
posted  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  we  find  many 
newspaper  clippings  referring  to  her  talks  on  the 
following  subjects  as  well  as  to  many  others  equally 
interesting  and  attractive:  "Our  Country  and  the 
World — Democracy;*'  "The  Making  of  Laws — 
Legislatures;"  "The  Administration  of  Law — Of- 
ficers;" "The  Interpretation  of  Law — Courts;" 
"The  Labor  Unions;"  "Industrial  Revolutions;" 
"The  Coming  Revolution  in  Russia;"  "Airships 
and  the  Law  of  Gravitation;"  "The  Russian  Peas- 
antry;" "The  Greatest  Man  In  China;"  "The  Em- 
press Dowager;"  "What  Europeans  Are  Saying 
About  American  Women;"  "The  Spread  of  the 
White  Race  in  Africa;"  "Curious  Facts  About 
Travel  by  Railway;"  "The  New  International 
Language — Esperanto;"  "The  International  Con- 
ference Concerning  Morocco;"  "The  New  Theory 
of  the  Origin  of  the  Species;"  "Civilization  in 

Page   Two   Hundred   Thirty-Four 


Return  to  America 

Siam;"  "Porto  Rico  and  the  Isle  of  Pines;"  "Our 
Island  of  Guam  in  Its  International  Relations;'* 
"Our  Lesser  Possessions  in  the  Pacific — Tutuila 
and  Manua;"  "Present  Opportunities  for  Higher 
Education  Without  Personal  Cost;"  "What  Ani- 
mals Think;'*  "Natural  Evolution  of  the  German 
Government — From  Autocracy  to  Socialism;*' 
"The  Wonders  of  Ant  Life;"  "The  Memory  of 
Ants;"  "Recent  Travels  Among  the  Pigmies  of  Af- 
rica;" "Evidence  That  the  Planet  Mars  Is  Inhabit- 
ed;" "The  Farming  Operations  of  Our  National 
Government;"  "Arctic  Explorations  by  Airship;" 
"Effects  of  the  Panama  Canal  and  Pan-American 
Railway  on  North  and  South  America;"  "The  In- 
fluence of  Sunlight  Upon  the  Present  and  Future 
Distribution  of  the  Races  of  Mankind;"  "What  Re- 
strictions Should  Be  Placed  on  Japanese  and  Chin- 
ese Immigration;"  "What  Should  Be  the  Status  of 
Asiatics  in  This  Country;"  "Affairs  in  the  Congo 
Free  State;"  "The  Giving  of  Free  Meals  to  Under- 
fed School  Children  in  the  Public  Schools;"  "The 
New  Theory  of  Matter;"  "Poland  in  Revolution;" 
"Canada  and  Canadians  in  Their  Present  Relations 
to  the  United  States;"  "The  World's  Battle  With 
Consumption;**  "The  Old  and  New  Woman  in 
Japan;"  "The  Utilization  of  Great  Deserts;" 
"Persia  in  the  Politics  of  Europe;"  "The  Passage  of 

Page  Two   Hundred   Thirty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

a  Race — the  Australian  Aborigines;"  "Present  As- 
pect of  the  Negro  Question  in  the  United  States;'* 
"Kingdom  Yoked  With  Empire — Austria-Hun- 
gary." 

The  lecture  field  yielded  Miss  Fielde  greater  fin- 
ancial returns  than  any  other  one  of  her  several 
enterprises.  She  was  not  infrequently  paid  as 
much  as  a  hundred  dollars  a  night  for  a  ten  days' 
course  and  often  her  self-managed  entertainments 
averaged  far  greater  sums.  During  her  career  in 
New  York  City  her  earnings  were  comparatively 
large,  but  her  savings  were  quite  small.  This  was 
largely  due  to  the  fact  that  she  made  it  a  practice  to 
contribute  liberally  for  the  advancement  of  every 
movement  for  public  good  for  which  she  was  im- 
portuned, often  giving  far  beyond  her  means. 
While  she  was  a  person  of  well-defined  business 
principles — as  systematic  and  orderly  in  financial 
matters  as  in  all  else-*-she  had  no  ambition  to  accu- 
mulate riches.  About  her  only  interest  was  the  ad- 
vancement of  the  cause  of  humanity  and  to  this  she 
devoted  the  greater  share  of  her  substance  and  the 
whole  of  her  energies.  A  little  story  told  of  Miss 
Fielde  will  serve  to  illustrate  her  ruling  passion  as 
well  as  her  regard  for  money  and  her  idea  of  its 
proper  uses: 

When  the  plans  were  being  made  for  the  Prohi- 

Page    Two   Hundred   Thirty-Six 


Return  to  America 

bition  campaign  in  the  State  of  Washington,  Miss 
Fielde,  then  living  in  Seattle,  was  approached  by 
the  Financial  Committee  and  asked  how  much 
money  she  would  donate  to  the  cause.  After  a 
short,  rapid  calculation,  she  replied  with  a  humor- 
ous affectation  of  confidence:  "If  I  limit  myself 
to  one  new  gown  this  year  and  to  a  few  other  les- 
ser economies,  I  will  be  able  to  give  fifteen  hundred 
dollars  without  any  very  embarrassing  depriva- 
tions." 

Of  her  vacations  at  Wood's  Hole  Miss  Fielde 
says:  "Between  my  return  from  China  in  1892  and 
my  going  West  in  1 907,  I  spent  nine  summers,  four 
months  each,  at  Wood's  Hole,  Massachusetts, 
studying  or  in  original  research  at  the  Marine  Bio- 
logical Laboratory.  In  1 894  I  took  the  course  in 
Embryology  under  Dr.  Frank  R.  Lillie,  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Chicago,  who  is  the  director.  In  1873 
Louis  Agassiz  established  a  marine  biological  labor- 
atory on  Buzzard's  Bay.  After  his  death  the  school 
was  abandoned.  The  plan  was  renewed  in  1  880  by 
the  establishment  of  a  laboratory  at  Annisquam, 
where  Alpheus  Hyatt  was  active.  In  1 888  the  la- 
boratory was  reorganized  and  placed  at  Wood's 
Hole,  with  Dr.  Whitman  as  director.  The  labora- 
tory has  been  essentially  the  contributions  of  bio- 
logists working  there.  A  new  building,  provided 
by  the  generosity  of  Mr.  Charles  R.  Crane,  was  de- 
dicated in  1914.  Since  Professor  Lillie  has  been 
director,  Dr.  Gilman  A.  Drew,  assistant  director, 
has  resided  permanently  at  Wood's  Hole." 

Page  Two  Hundred  Thirty-Seven 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-TWO 

The  League  For  Political  Education;  Its  Organiza- 
tion and  Activities 

IM  1 894  Miss  Fielde  was  one  of  six  women  who 
founded  the  League  for  Political  Education  of 
New   York    City.      The    names    of    the    other 
founders  are,  Mrs.  Henry  M.  Sanders,  Dr.  Mary 
Putnam   Jacobi,   Mrs.    Robert   Abbe,    Mrs.    C.   A. 
Runkle  and  Mrs.  Ben  Ali  Haggin.     The  organiza- 
tion of  the  League  was  the  outgrowth  of  a  vigorous 
campaign  for  woman's  suffrage  in  which  the  pro- 
suffrage  advocates  and  workers  lost  the  battle. 

Early  in  1894  the  Legislature  of  New  York  au- 
thorized a  Constitutional  convention  to  be  held 
during  the  coming  month  of  June.  A  movement 
was  inaugurated  by  the  women  of  the  metropolis, 
many  of  them  of  high  social  standing  and  world- 
wide influence,  for  the  purpose  of  popularizing  an 
amendment  to  the  proposed  new  Constitution 
which  would  give  women  citizens  the  right  to  ex- 
ercise the  elective  franchise  as  well  as  men.  The 
movement  had  met  with  opposition,  equally  vigor- 
ous, led  by  women  of  equally  high  social  standing 
and  equally  influential.  A  monster  petition  had 
been  secured  demanding  the  enfranchisment  of 
women,  and  an  equally  large  number  of  women 

Fage  Two  Hundred  Thirty-Eight 


The  League  for  Political  Education 

had  signed  a  protest  to  the  proposed  amendment. 

Miss  Fielde,  Mrs.  Sanders,  Dr.  Jacobi,  Mrs.  Abbe, 
Mrs.  Runkle,  and  Mrs.  Haggin  had  led  the  pro- 
suffrage  forces.  They  were,  of  course,  greatly  dis- 
appointed by  the  failure  of  the  project,  but  not  at 
all  embittered.  At  a  subsequent  meeting  of  these 
women,  at  which  the  campaign  was  reviewed  and 
discussed  at  length,  the  opinion  prevailed  that  the 
defeat  was  due,  primarily,  to  ignorance  on  the  part 
of  both  men  and  women  citizens.  Before  the  wom- 
en separated,  plans  were  outlined  for  continuing 
the  suffrage  work  by  providing  the  means  of  en- 
lightening women  as  to  the  great  importance  of 
political  and  civic  understanding  and  to  educate 
them  regarding  the  obligations  and  rights  of  citi- 
zenship. Thus  the  League  for  Political  Education 
was  projected. 

It  was  not,  however,  until  January  8th,  1895, 
that  organization  of  the  League  was  effected.  At 
this  time  a  meeting  was  called  at  the  home  of  Mrs. 
H.  M.  Sanders,  at  which  over  two  hundred  men 
and  women  were  present.  Here  the  plans  were 
explained,  the  membership  rolls  signed,  officers 
elected  and  a  committee  appointed  to  secure  per- 
manent headquarters.  Mrs.  Henry  M.  Sanders  was 
elected  president ;  Mrs.  C.  A.  Runkle  and  Mrs.  Rob- 
ert Abbe,  vice-presidents;  Mrs.  Ben  AH  Haggin, 

Page  Two  Hundred  Thirty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

treasurer;  Dr.  Mary  Putnam  Jacobi,  correspond- 
ing secretary,  and  Miss  Fielde,  recording  secretary. 
The  New  York  World  of  February  24th,  1 895, 
under  the  caption  "Will  Teach  Women  Politics," 
contains  the  following  report  of  the  League  and  its 
activities : 

"Certain  women  who  were  prominent  in  the 
suffrage  campaign  last  year,  have  organized  a  league 
for  political  education.  They  have  established 
headquarters  in  the  Berkeley  Lyceum,  No.  23  West 
Forty-Fourth  street,  and  every  day  the  recording 
secretary,  Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde,  is  present  to  receive 
visitors  and  impart  information  and  advice.  The 
object  of  the  League,  stated  by  Miss  Fielde,  is  *to 
arouse  among  women  practical  interest  in  public 
affairs,  in  civic  institutions  and  in  good  government 
by  means  of  a  broad  and  systematic  study  of  the 
same. 

'  'At  all  times,  and  especially  in  times  of  politi- 
cal peril,'  she  said  recently,  'women  exert  a  power- 
ful influence  on  the  weal  of  the  State.  It  is  import- 
ant that  this  influence  should  be  intelligently  exert- 
ed towards  wise  measures  in  government.  The 
League  brings  women  together  for  the  discussion 
of  permanently  important  topics  and  makes  them 
better  acquainted  with  each  other's  true  characteris- 
tics and  capabilities.  This  will  develop  a  sounder 
judgment  of  each  other,  just  as  men  in  business 
circles  form  a  correct  estimate  of  each  other's  fit- 
ness for  certain  lines  of  work. 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty 


The  League  for  Political  Education 

'  'As  to  the  question  whether  women  ought  to 
vote,'  said  Miss  Fielde,  'that  depends,  in  my  opin- 
ion, on  the  answer  to  the  question  whether  the  in- 
nate tendencies  of  women,  acquired  or  natural,  are 
going  to  complicate  or  assist  in  the  solution  of  the 
pressing  industrial  problems  which  at  this  moment 
imperil  our  safety  as  a  people.  Many  women  suf- 
fragists are  themselves  the  strongest  possible  argu- 
ments against  woman  suffrage.  My  own  view  is 
that  all  native-born,  self-supporting  women  should 
be  enfranchised.  This,  however,  is  not  a  suffrage 
league,  although  the  majority  of  the  members  thus 
far  are  suffragists,  and  the  officers  of  the  league  are 
the  same  women  who  comprised  the  Voluntary 
Committee  of  the  suffrage  campaign  of  last  spring 
before  and  during  the  session  of  the  New  York 
State  Constitutional  Convention. 

'The  League  is  distinctly  for  political  education, 
and  is  ready  to  help  women  of  all  beliefs  and  con- 
ditions so  far  as  it  can.  Membership  in  the  League 
comes  from  the  payment  of  an  annual  fee  of  two 
dollars  and  a  promise  to  study  the  literature  issued. 
We  are  beginning  this  course  of  political  education 
with  Fiske's  Civil  Government  of  the  United 
States  and  An  Outline  of  Study  prepared  by  Dr. 
Mary  Putnam  Jacobi.  This  Outline  is  practically  a 
catechism.  Questions  are  asked  and  the  student  is 
obliged  to  look  up  the  answers  in  the  books  re- 
ferred to.  Many  of  the  questions  are  from  Fiske 
and  Bryce,  but  other  works  also  are  to  be  consulted. 

'The  plan  is  to  form  circles,  or  clubs,  either  with 

Page   Two   Hundred   Forty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

or  without  special  teachers.  Anyone  who  so  desires 
may  form  a  study  circle  and  hold  meetings  in  her 
own  house,  in  a  hall  or  club  room.  The  only  outlay 
that  is  required  for  commencing  is  the  price  of  the 
books,  which  may  be  procured  at  the  League  head- 
quarters. So  far,  two  circles  or  classes  have  been 
formed.  They  both  meet  in  the  Berkeley  Lyceum. 
Mrs.  Charles  Runkle  instructs  one  of  them  every 
Tuesday  morning  at  eleven  o'clock  on  the  history 
and  growth  of  civil  government  in  the  United 
States.  I  lecture  every  Friday  on  the  powers  and 
duties  of  the  New  York  officials.  We  do  not  teach 
theories,  simply  facts.  By  the  methods  we  use  we 
advocate  no  particular  theory  of  government.  We 
are  simply  in  pursuit  of  facts  and  those  truths  which 
result  in  good  government. 

'  'And  I  want  to  say  that  the  parties  which  are 
now  dominant  will  find  that  they  have  lost  their 
strength  when  that  time  comes  unless  they  hasten 
to  see  the  handwriting  on  the  wall.  Equal  suf- 
frage today  has  a  big  majority  in  its  favor.  Over 
700,000  of  the  people  of  New  York  State,  eligible 
to  citizenship,  have  put  themselves  on  record  as  be- 
ing in  favor  of  granting  the  franchise  to  women. 
The  officers  have  decided  to  leave  suffrage  in  abey- 
ance for  the  present  and  content  themselves  with 
arousing  intelligent  womanhood  to  a  knowledge  of 
what  government  is  and  how  it  should  be  adminis- 
tered. Other  courses  of  lectures  are  to  follow,  a 
series  of  them  to  be  on  common  law.' 

"Mrs.  Sanders,  the  president,  is  the  wife  of  the 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty-Two 


The  League  for  Political  Education 

Rev.  Henry  M.  Sanders,  pastor  of  the  Madison 
Avenue  Baptist  Church.  She  is  a  woman  of  wealth, 
talent  and  energy.  Mrs.  Charles  A.  Runkle  has 
been  prominent  in  many  reform  movements  as  the 
east  side  women  and  shop  girls  of  that  section  can 
testify.  Mrs.  Robert  Abbe  is  the  mother  of  the 
musician,  Courtlandt  Palmer,  and  with  her  first  hus- 
band, the  late  Courtlandt  Palmer,  took  an  active 
interest  in  the  Nineteenth  Century  Club.  Both 
Dr.  and  Mrs.  Abbe  are  ardent  suffragists.  Mrs. 
Ben  Ali  Haggin  married  the  son  of  the  California 
millionaire  and  horseman.  Miss  Fielde  is  an  au- 
thor, probably  best  known  through  her  book,  'A 
Corner  in  Cathay/  For  many  years  she  lived  in 
China.** 

Miss  Fielde  was  actively  connected  with  the 
League  for  Political  Education  for  thirteen  years; 
at  the  end  of  which  time  she  was  presented  with  a 
life-membership  from  the  voluntary  subscriptions 
of  her  many  admiring  pupils.  Though  the  League 
was  an  aftermath  of  the  New  York  Voluntary  As- 
sociation of  Equal  Suffragists,  it  was,  as  its  name 
indicates,  an  educational  institution.  It  was  open 
to  both  women  and  men,  though  it  acquired  only  a 
few  male  members  during  the  first  ten  years  of  its 
career. 

The  work  of  the  League  was  so  systematized  that 
membership  could  be  had  by  the  payment  of  a 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

small  annual  fee  and  a  pledge  of  earnest  attention 
to  the  prescribed  studies  and  disciplinary  routine  of 
the  institution.  However,  these  conditions  entitled 
a  member  only  to  the  uses  of  the  study-rooms  and 
library  and  admittance  to  all  the  free  lectures,  sev- 
eral of  which  were  delivered  each  week.  But  if  a 
person  wished  to  take  a  special  course  of  instruc- 
tion in  any  one  of  the  several  branches  taught  at  the 
institution,  a  special  charge  was  made.  Miss  Fielde 
organized  and  taught  classes  in  civil  government, 
parliamentary  usage  and  political  ecenomy,  the  tui- 
tional  fees  from  which  she  derived  a  comfortable 
income.  Also,  each  week,  during  nine  months  of 
the  year,  she  gave  a  free  lecture  on  current  events, 
municipal  affairs  and  business  relations.  One  of 
the  more  attractive  of  this  latter  part  of  the  program 
was  the  "Educational  Excursions, "  which  she  orig- 
inated and,  for  the  first  eight  years,  led.  Of  these 
excursions,  the  League's  official  report  for  the  year 
1900  says: 

"During  this  season  Miss  Fielde's  class  studying 
Civil  Government  has  visited  many  of  the  City  De- 
partments and  City  Institutions.  The  excursions 
have  often  occupied  a  whole  day,  and  have  included 
the  Fire,  Police,  Docks,  Charities  and  many  other 
City  Departments;  the  Institutions  of  Blackwell's 
and  Randall's  Islands,  and  those  in  Manhattan  for 
Deaf  Mutes  and  for  the  Blind;  many  of  the  courts, 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty-Four 


The  League  for  Political  Education 

lower  and  higher;  the  Tombs,  the  Stock  and  Pro- 
duce Exchanges,  the  Mills  Hotel,  the  Chinese  and 
Italian  Quarters,  Bellevue  Hospital,  Governor's 
Island,  the  Immigrant  Clearing  House,  the  Post- 
office,  and  the  Navy  Yard.  Eighteen  such  excur- 
sions have  been  made,  the  number  of  participants 
varying  from  ten  to  thirty-two,  with  an  average  of 
seventeen. 

"The  value  of  these  opportunities  for  the  obser- 
vation of  civic  conditions  has  been  great,  and  has 
prompted  the  members  of  this  class  to  closer  study. 
In  no  preceding  year  have  the  members  of  this  class 
spent  so  much  time  and  energy  in  the  preparation 
and  presentation  of  papers  bearing  on  the  topics 
studied  by  the  class." 

In  1897  Miss  Fielde  wrote  "A  Political  Primer 
of  New  York  City  and  State,'*  a  work  unique  in  the 
field  of  literary  production.  She  presented  the 
copyright  to  the  League,  which  sold  the  books,  the 
proceeds  being  applied  to  the  current  expenses  of 
that  institution.  This  must  have  proved  an  enter- 
prise of  considerable  profit,  as  four  editions,  each  of 
several  thousand  copies  were  printed  before  the  de- 
mand for  them  was  supplied.  The  book  was  dedi- 
cated to  Mrs.  Henry  M.  Sanders,  president  of  the 
League,  and  is  still  in  print  and  is  still  regarded  as 
a  reliable  source  of  reference.  The  New  York 
Journal  of  November  7th,  1897,  contains  the  fol- 
lowing criticism  regarding  the  Primer: 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

'The  first  election  campaign  of  Greater  New 
York  is  certainly  a  fit  occasion  for  the  production 
for  just  such  a  manual  as  this.  Even  the  politicians 
continue  to  plead  ignorance  of  many  of  the  details 
of  the  new  charter,  but  this  little  primer  leaves  no 
one  in  the  dark  as  to  the  essential  features  of  the 
new  government  of  the  great  city.  Furthermore, 
the  book  covers  New  York  State  as  well  as  city  pol- 
itics, and  is  a  complete  compendium  of  the  things 
that  the  voter  must  know  in  order  to  cast  an  in- 
telligent vote.  Questions  connected  with  natural- 
ization and  citizenship  are  fully  discussed,  and  the 
complicated  system  of  our  courts  is  carefully  de- 
scribed. There  is  no  other  work  of  its  kind  which 
embodies  so  much  information  in  so  small  a  com- 
pass." 

In  1899  Miss  Fielde  wrote  and  published  her 
"Parliamentary  Procedure."  She  had  taught  parlia- 
mentary law  at  the  League  since  the  organization  of 
that  institution  and  early  discovered  the  need  of  a 
text-book  that  would  be  adapted  to  beginners  in 
the  study  of  that  science.  The  work  that  she  pro- 
duced is  a  model  of  literary  skill ;  each  of  the  guid- 
ing principles  in  parliamentary  usage  being  cleverly 
illustrated  by  a  series  of  questions  and  answers  and 
clearly  demonstrated  in  the  form  of  dramatized 
drills.  Two  editions  of  Fielde's  Parliamentary  Pro- 
cedure were  published;  the  first  in  New  York  under 
the  auspices  of  the  League  for  Political  Education, 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty-Six 


The  League  for  Political  Education 

and  the  second  in  1914,  while  the  author  lived  in 
Seattle.  The  latter  edition  was  issued  for  the  use  of 
the  club  women  of  Washington. 

Miss  Fielde  became  the  author  of  another  re- 
markable literary  production  while  connected  with 
the  League  for  Political  Education.  This  was  her 
"Fourteen  Rules  for  Polite  Conversation."  It  was 
a  small  pamphlet  of  a  few  pages  only,  but  it  is  justly 
regarded  as  a  gem.  Whether  or  not  the  general 
deportment  of  the  League's  membership  was  the  in- 
spiring cause  of  the  work  has  never  been  disclosed. 
Miss  Fielde  herself  was  an  adept  in  all  forms  of  po- 
lite conduct  and  not  at  all  tolerant  of  conversational 
rudeness.  It  was  her  practice,  however,  to  correct 
such  offenses  on  the  part  of  others  by  a  wise  hint 
or  unobtrusive  suggestion  that  carried  with  it  none 
of  the  discomforting  effects  of  a  personal  rebuke. 
The  "Rules  for  Polite  Conversation'*  was  gladly  ac- 
cepted as  a  free  gift  by  the  management  of  the 
League  and  incorporated  into  its  system  of  instruc- 
tion. Many  editions  of  the  pamphlet  were  printed 
and  sold,  which  brought  added  laurels  to  the  reputa- 
tion of  the  author  and  proved  a  source  of  consid- 
erable profit  to  the  League. 

The  League  for  Political  Education  still  exists; 
but  only  three  of  the  noble  women  who  founded  it 
are  living.  It  has  recently  passed  its  twenty-third 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

anniversary,  each  year  of  its  existence  having  wit- 
nessed an  increased  membership  and  a  widening  of 
the  circle  of  its  influence.  In  all  that  time  it  has  re- 
mained faithful  to  the  conception  of  its  founders 
and  worked  consistently  for  the  cause  of  good  citi- 
zenship. During  the  first  ten  years  of  its  career,  it 
was  conducted  and  maintained  by  women;  but  at 
present  the  sexes  are  more  impartially  represented 
in  its  management.  In  a  recent  circular  containing 
a  report  of  its  past  achievements  and  an  announce- 
ment of  its  future  Activities,  the  names  of  many  of 
the  most  distinguished  men  and  women  illumine  its 
programs.  Among  them  we  find  those  of  Wood- 
row  Wilson,  Theodore  Roosevelt,  Felix  Adler,  Lil- 
lian D.  Wald,  Jane  Addams,  Richard  Watson  Gil- 
der, Charlotte  Perkins  Gilman,  Hamilton  W.  Mabie, 
Anna  Howard  Shaw,  Thomas  Wentworth  Higgin- 
son,  R.  Heber  Newton,  J.  Lincoln  Steffens,  Agnes 
Repplier,  Thomas  Nelson  Page,  John  Mitchell, 
Booker  T.  Washington,  William  Travers  Jerome, 
Joseph  H.  Choate,  Oscar  S.  Straus,  Seth  Low,  Carl 
Schurz,  Edward  Everett  Hale,  Charles  Dudley 
Warner,  Mark  Twain,  Henry  Van  Dyke,  Margaret 
Deland,  Ida  M.  Tarbell,  Helen  Keller,  Mrs.  Hum- 
phrey Ward,  G.  Marconi,  Robert  E.  Peary,  James 
Bryce,  Prince  Peter  Kropotkin,  Rev.  Robert  Hugh 
Benson,  Ellen  Terry,  J.  Forbes  Robinson,  Lyman 

Page  Two  Hundred  Forty-Bight 


The  League  for  Political  Education 

Abbott,  Stephen  S.  Wise,  H.  G.  Wells,  Charles  F. 
Aked,  General  Leonard  Wood,  Corinne  Roosevelt 
Robinson,  Ella  Flagg  Young. 

The  present  officers  and  managers  of  the  League 
are  Robert  Erskine  Ely,  Director;  Mary  B.  Cleve- 
land, Executive  Secretary;  Christine  L.  Munger, 
Secretary  to  the  Director;  Evelyn  L.  Shulters,  Mem- 
bership Secretary.  The  Board  of  Trustees  is  com- 
posed of  A.  Barton  Hepburn,  Chairman ;  Miss  Laura 
V.  Day,  Secretary;  Robert  G.  Mead,  Treasurer; 
Mrs.  Robert  Abbe,  Mrs.  Henry  A.  Alexander,  John 
Bates  Clark,  William  H.  Bliss,  Robert  Erskine  Ely, 
John  Martin,  Miss  Spence. 


Fag-e  Two  Hundred  Forty-Nine 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-THREE 

Miss  Fielde  As  a  Writer 

MISS  FIELDE  attained  distinction  in  no  less 
than  four  fields  of  personal  endeavor.    She 
was  a  Christian  missionary  of  unsurpassed 
achievement;  the  author  of  ten  successful  books; 
a  notable  scientist;   and  a  profound  student  and 
teacher  of  government.     Her  greatest  renown,  per- 
haps, is  due  to  her  reputation  as  a  writer,  though, 
unquestionably,    the   more    enduring    measure    of 
fame  will  attach  to  her  name  for  scientific  discover- 
ies and  disclosures. 

Her  greatest  literary  production  was  her  "Dic- 
tionary of  the  Swatow  Dialect."  This  work  requir- 
ed ten  years  of  patient  devotion,  great  tenacity  of 
purpose  and  uncompromising  industry.  But  she 
proved  herself  well  qualified  for  the  undertaking. 
It  was  written  while  she  was  an  employe  of  the 
American  Baptist  Missionary  Society,  which  pub- 
lished the  book  at  its  own  expense  and  received  the 
full  award  of  all  accruing  profits  derived  from  its 
sale.  The  dictionary  is  still  used  as  a  book  of  ref- 
erence in  many  parts  of  China,  being  equally  valu- 
able to  Chinese  seeking  to  learn  the  English  equival- 
ents to  Chinese  words  as  to  English  speaking  deni- 
zens, missionaries,  tourists,  traders  and  consular 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Writer 

officials  in  their  desire  to  hold  converse  with  the 
natives.  It  has  passed  through  many  editions  since 
it  was  first  printed,  but  being  so  nearly  complete 
at  the  start,  comparatively  few  improvements  or 
changes  have  been  made  in  the  intervening  sixty 
years.  In  her  opinion,  her  next  most  important 
book  was  "A  Corner  of  Cathay/*  Of  this  volume, 
The  Boston  Courier  of  October  21st,  1894,  says: 
"This  rather  exquisite  volume  is  a  series  of 
sketches  made  during  a  residence  of  fifteen  years 
in  China,  chiefly  at  Swatow,  with  frequent  sojourns 
in  localities  and  villages  which  no  other  foreigner 
had  ever  visited  and  with  extensive  travel  in  other 
parts  of  the  Empire.  The  author,  Miss  Adele  M. 
Fielde,  had  previously  written  a  dictionary  of  the 
Swatow  dialect,  a  volume  called  'Pagoda  Shadows' 
and  other  books  in  the  same  line,  and  therefore 
enjoys  an  acquaintance  with  the  local  dialect  and 
with  native  women,  so  that  she  was  enabled  to  gain 
information  directly  from  all  classes  and  from  both 
sexes.  All  that  she  here  records  has  been  amply 
verified  by  personal  observation.  She  has  discussed 
the  subjects  she  treats  of  with  many  natives,  and 
has  accordingly  set  forth  only  such  ideas  as  were 
generally  agreed  on  as  true.  Many  of  the  pages  in 
the  volume  were  papers  that  were  published  in  the 
Popular  Science  Monthly  and  other  periodicals. 
Her  present  object  is  to  help  people  to  under- 
stand the  character  of  our  Mongolian  guests, 
and  to  know  whether  their  thoughts  are 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-one 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

so  very  unlike  our  own.  While  many  of  the 
matters  portrayed  are  local,  all  are  intended  to  be 
typical  of  the  nation  as  a  whole.  The  singular  ho- 
mogeniety  of  the  Chinese  and  their  general  con- 
formity to  type  renders  it  more  than  commonly  dif- 
ficult to  interpret  them  and  properly  depict  their 
traits  concealed  under  a  mask  of  facial  immobility, 
to  those  who  do  not  know  the  people  experimental- 
ly and  who  have  not  come  in  touch  with  them  per- 
sonally. 

"The  subjects  treated  are  farm  life  in  China;  the 
household  and  personal  economy  of  the  people; 
their  marriage  laws  and  usages ;  their  mortuary  cus- 
toms; the  babies  and  their  grandmothers;  child- 
ren's games;  school  and  schooling;  the  Chinese 
measures  of  time ;  their  suits  at  law ;  fabulous  people 
and  animals;  sundry  superstitions;  the  Chinese 
theory  of  evolution;  Confucius  and  his  teachings; 
the  Tauists  and  their  magic  arts ;  and  Chinese  filial, 
fraternal  and  friendly  piety.  This  recital  suffici- 
ently shows  about  all  the  features  of  Mongolian 
life,  as  well  as  the  substance  of  Chinese  character, 
brought  out  into  a  clearer  view  through  the  por- 
trayal of  the  author.  The  rather  singular  thing  is 
that  it  is  a  woman  that  makes  the  mystery  of  Chin- 
ese life  so  clear  to  our  comprehension,  at  a  time 
•when  the  desire  is  as  eager  as  it  is  general  to  know 
all  that  can  be  known  about  a  nation  long  buried 
to  the  world  and  now  being  resurrected  by  the  sharp 
spade  of  war. 

"The  illustrations,  twelve  in  number,  are  a  won- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-two 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Writer 

derful  addition  to  the  worth  of  the  book.  They  are 
unsurpassed,  on  rice  paper  and  the  first  of  the  kind 
ever  produced  in  this  country.  All  the  illustrations 
are  done  by  Artists  in  the  celebrated  school  of  Go 
Leng,  at  Swatow.  The  pages  have  all  the  glow  of 
a  romance.  One  cannot  light  anywhere  on  them 
without  being  instantly  fastened  to  the  strangely 
original  matter  exploited  so  effectively  on  them. 
It  will  save  one  the  trouble  of  a  land  journey  and 
an  ocean  voyage  to  read  this  author's  record  of  her 
observations  with  the  natives  of  that  far,  unknown 
country  where  life  is  measured  in  cycles  rather  than 
in  broken  years." 

Another  of  Miss  Fielde's  books  of  Chinese  life 
is  exceptionally  valuable ;  describing,  as  it  does,  the 
fanciful  side  of  Chinese  character.  This  was  en- 
titled "The  Strayed  Arrow  or  Chinese  Nights'  En- 
tertainment," published  in  1893.  The  following 
review  of  the  work,  contained  in  the  columns  of 
the  Boston  Watchman,  is  a  fairly  good  account  of 
its  contents  and  purposes: 

"Children  and  grown  folks  may  read  together 
these  tales  with  and  without  a  moral,  and  find  pleas- 
ant entertainment,  if  nothing  more,  on  the  forty 
stories  strung  on  the  thread  of  a  very  tenuous  fila- 
ment called  the  romance  of  'The  Strayed  Arrow.' 
Aside  from  the  fun  and  the  story  the  reader  re- 
ceives in  a  most  delightful  way,  much  information 
of  the  beliefs  and  customs  of  the  Middle  Kingdom. 
As  these  tales  were  heard  or  overheard  by  the  writer 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

in  the  Swatow  vernacular,  and  have  been  illustrat- 
ed by  native  artists  in  the  school  of  the  celebrated 
painter,  Go  Leng,  at  Swatow,  we  may  feel  warrant- 
ed in  accepting  their  genuineness  as  a  reflection  of 
the  almond-eyed  race's  romantic  idiosyncrasies. 
Several  of  the  stories  are  of  Betrothal,  Marriage 
and  the  Go-Betweens  who  make  the  matches. 
Among  them  is  one  which  tells  how  a  hunchback, 
with  a  handsome  face,  and  a  hair-lipped  girl,  with 
a  fine  form,  entrapped  each  other  in  a  love  match, 
he  by  showing  his  face  to  her  from  a  sedan  chair, 
and  she  by  concealing  her  mouth  with  a  fan.  When 
the  marriage  ceremony  was  over,  the  bride  sudden- 
ly lowered  her  fan  and  murmured,  'Our  prospects 
are  determined  by  fate.'  The  groom  gazed  at  her 
an  instant,  then  rising  and  turning  his  hunch  tow- 
ard her,  he  exclaimed,  'Your  prospect  is  not  nearly 
so  bad  as  my  retrospect,'  and  thus  was  illustrated 
the  Chinese  proverb,  'It's  no  use  to  try  to  change 
one's  fate  in  wedlock.'  Another  proverb,  'The 
devils  dance  on  one  who  knows  no  poetry,'  gives 
rise  to  the  story  of  an  old  woman  who  learned  a 
jingle-jangle,  and  by  repeating  it  in  her  sleep  was 
saved  from  robbery.  If  you  wish,  then,  to  spend 
an  evening  in  the  Kwangtung  province,  with  queer 
people,  take  this  pretty  souvenir  from  far  Cathay 
and  you  will  find  Kong  Chiang  right,  that  'Half  is 
sweet,  half  is  salt.  Stop  a  bit  and  take  a  bite.'  ' 

With  the  exception  of  her  dictionary  of  the  Swa- 
tow dialect,  "Pagoda  Shadows"  was  the  first  book 
published  by  Miss  Fielde.  It  is  a  volume  of  three 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-four 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Writer 

hundred  pages,  well  illustrated  and  full  of  human 
interest.  In  1886,  when  it  first  issued  from  the 
press,  it  proved  a  "best  seller,*'  the  entire  first  edi- 
tion having  been  disposed  of  in  less  than  a  week. 
It  passed  through  six  editions  before  public  inter- 
est began  to  lag  and  even  at  the  present  time,  it  is 
still  popular  with  students  seeking  expert  and  ac- 
curate information  regarding  the  customs,  habits 
and  peculiarities  of  the  Chinese. 

The  title  of  the  book  is  perhaps  significant  of  the 
shadows  cast  over  Chinese  life  due  to  the  influence 
of  Buddhism  and  the  depressing  terrorism  of  the 
nation-wide  beliefs  in  demonology  and  other  forms 
of  superstition.  Mr.  Joseph  Cook,  the  noted 
preacher  and  publicist  of  Boston,  wrote  an  intro- 
duction to  the  work  in  which  he  pays  the  author 
some  very  high  compliments.  In  his  closing  para- 
graph,  he  says: 

"I  have  read  much  of  Chinese  history  and  sta- 
tistics; I  have  examined  the  best  sources  of  infor- 
mation as  to  the  Chinese  religious  and  social  life; 
I  have  studied  such  translations  of  the  Chinese 
classics  as  have  come  in  my  way,  but  I  find  the 
simple  story  written  by  Miss  Fielde  has  brought 
me  nearer  to  a  clear  view  of  Chinese  life  and  Chin- 
ese needs  than  anything  else  I  have  used  as  a 
guide." 

The  Presbyterian  Messenger,  of  London,  Eng- 
land, says  of  "Pagoda  Shadows": 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"This  little  volume  of  some  three  hundred  pages, 
divided  into  thirty-five  chapters,  is  one  of  the  most 
charming  and  life-like  books  on  'China  that  we 
know.  Nowhere  else  within  the  same  brief  com- 
pass can  be  found  so  varied  and  so  full  an  account, 
written  in  a  pleasant  and  clear  style,  of  many  of  the 
phases  under  which  life  in  China  presents  itself  to 
those  who  visit  that  strange  land.  But  Miss  Fielde 
is  more  than  a  visitor,  and  her  studies  possess  far 
more  value  than  the  hastily  formed  impression  of 
travellers,  who  give  but  a  passing  glance  at  the  peo- 
ple and  their  ways,  or  make  a  few  inquiries  second- 
hand. She  has  for  many  years  lived  among  the 
people  of  whom  she  writes.  She  has  acquired  their 
language  and  can  converse  freely  in  it,  and,  both  in 
Swatow  and  in  many  parts  of  the  extensive  and 
populous  mission-field  of  which  it  is  the  headquart- 
ers, she  has  had  much  personal  intercourse  with 
them.  Travelling  by  boat  along  the  rivers  and 
water-ways  that  so  abound  in  the  fertile  plains  of 
Tie  Chiu,  or  going  on  foot,  or  by  the  slow  and 
wearysome  sedan  chair,  she  has  made  many  toil- 
sbme  journeys  to  visit  her  Chinese  sisters.  She  has 
stopped  at  the  wayside  'inn'  and  chatted  with  them ; 
she  has  put  up  in  their  poor  and  dirty  abodes,  and 
partaken  of  their  humble  but  genuine  hospitality. 
She  has  seen  them  as  they  are  in  their  large  cities, 
in  their  towns  and  villages,  in  the  open  air  and  in 
their  homes.  And  with  a  graphic  and  kindly  pen 
she  has  written  these  very  interesting  sketches  of 
the  life  and  manners  of  the  Chinese,  that  those  who 
read  them  may  be  led  to  think  of  that  multitudinous 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-six 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Writer 

people  with  a  living  sympathy,  and  take  a  practical 
interest  in  their  welfare.  Miss  Fielde's  own  work 
among  the  women  of  the  Swatow  region  has  been, 
we  have  reason  to  know,  fruitful  of  much  bless- 
ing; and  her  admirable  system  of  selecting  and 
training  and  superintending  Biblewomen,  has  de- 
servedly attracted  much  notice.  It  is  as  a  mission- 
ary that  Miss  Fielde  writes,  but  it  as  a  missionary 
with  a  quick  and  observant  eye,  a  sympathetic 
heart  and  ready  pen.  Those  who  read  her  book 
will  find  much  in  it  regarding  the  social  customs, 
regarding  the  idolatry  and  superstitions,  and  re- 
garding the  home  life  of  the  Chinese,  which  they 
seek  for  in  vain  in  larger  works.  Do  our  readers 
wish  to  see  some  of  the  fruits  of  heathenism  in  de- 
tail, do  they  wish  to  see  how  it  deadens  natural  af- 
fection, how  it  touches  and  blights  that  which  we 
in  Christendom  delight  to  call  'Home,  sweet  home,' 
how  it  mars,  and  degrades  and  perverts  all  the  vari- 
ous relations  of  life — then  let  them  read  'Pagoda 
Shadows.'  ' 

It  was  chiefly  as  the  author  of  newspaper  and 
magazine  articles  that  Miss  Fielde  did  her  greatest 
and  most  important  writing.  She  wrote  literally 
thousands  of  short  stories,  scientific  papers,  ser- 
mons, lectures,  philosophic  essays,  and  political  doc- 
uments, all  of  which  presented  the  highest  product 
of  human  thought  as  well  as  genuine  proof  of  her 
really  fine  literary  ability. 

Referring  to  her  work  as  a  writer  of  short  articles 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

for  current  periodicals,  a  contemporary  Seattle  au- 
thor of  note  wrote  her  the  following  appreciation 
in  a  personal  letter  of  June  1  1  th,  1914: 

"Dear  Lady  of  the  Beautiful  Books: 

"I  have  just  read  your  article  in  the  New  Repub- 
lic. To  see  such  work  as  yours  in  the  midst  of  a 
generation  of  slovenly  writers  and  cheap  book- 
makers is  refreshing  indeed.  I  wish  there  were 
more  like  you,  with  your  methodical,  trained,  mas- 
terful intellect.  Continue,  my  friend  and  fellow- 
traveller,  for  great  is  the  influence  of  the  printed 
word,  especially  when  it  comes  from  your  pen. 
'* Yours  for  still  pursuing,  still  achieving, 

"Emily  Inez  Denny." 

Among  the  short  stories  that  Miss  Fielde  wrote 
was  one  entitled:  "How  An  Ant  Went  to  Market 
and  Went  Home  Again."  This  was  written  for 
Miss  Olivia  Cauldwell,  daughter  of  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Samuel  Milbank  Cauldwell,  on  the  child's  tenth 
birthday.  Several  magazines  printed  the  unique 
story  and  pleasure  was  extended  to  countless  other 
children. 

Her  articles  on  scientific  subjects  alone  would 
furnish  material  for  a  half  dozen  large  volumes  if 
compiled  into  book  form;  and  her  written  contri- 
butions to  current  literature  discussing  sociological 
problems,  legislative  enactments  and  matters  of 
statute  law  are  even  more  voluminous. 

Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty-eight 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Writer 

Miss  Fielde  was  a  strong  believer  in  publicity. 
She  regarded  public  opinion  as  the  most  potent  fac- 
tor in  the  success  of  every  department  of  human 
endeavor.  Whenever  she  wished  to  promote  an 
advancement  or  improvement  in  civic  welfare,  her 
first  steps  were  to  take  the  public  into  her 
confidence  by  describing  the  manifold  advanta- 
ges of  the  proposed  change  through  the  medium- 
ship  of  the  public  press.  In  every  community 
wherein  she  lived  any  considerable  portion  of  her 
long  and  useful  life,  the  sands  of  time  are  deeply 
indented  by  her  literary  footprints. 


Page  Two  Hundred  Fifty  nine 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-FOUR 
Miss  Fielde  As  a  Scientist 

TO  PROPERLY  appraise  Miss  Fielde's  attain- 
ments in  science  or  her  achievements  in  the 
research  work  of  that  department  of  knowl- 
edge, presents  unusual  difficulties.  In  her  search 
for  facts,  she  was  an  indefatigable  worker,  careful 
in  classification  and  fearless  in  her  conclusions.  She 
delved  deep  in  many  branches  of  scientific  study 
and  investigation,  organic  as  well  as  inorganic, 
theoretic  as  well  as  established,  mystic  as  well  as 
pragmatic.  Her  investigations  were  made  from 
various  points  of  vantage  and  disadvantage,  from 
the  fields  that  surrounded  the  place  of  her  birth  to 
nearly  every  locality  on  earth. 

From  China  she  wrote  and  published  papers 
about  the  strange  but  "lovely  little  crawling  things" 
that  she  found  along  the  sea  shore  of  that  land.  At 
Wood's  Hole  she  discovered  how  ants  see  without 
eyes,  hear  without  ears  and  smell  without  noses. 
On  the  desert  of  Arizona  she  demonstrated  the 
hithertofore  unknown  fact  that  enough  water  could 
be  obtained  from  the  opuntia  cactus,  if  properly 
treated,  to  sustain  the  lives  of  thirst-bound  travel- 
ers. In  Alaska  we  find  her  writing  learnedly  re- 
garding geological  formations  in  making  a  report 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Scientist 

on  some  coal  prospects.  From  weird  heights  in 
the  Himalayas  she  made  astronomical  observations 
with  an  opera  glass,  and  wrote  interestingly  and  en- 
tertainingly thereof.  In  India  she  investigated  the 
psychic  phenomena  peculiar  to  the  Hindu  fakirs, 
and  published  her  conclusion  in  a  number  of  maga- 
zine articles.  While  in  Berlin  she  made  a  scientific 
analysis  of  the  German  Government;  its  origin, 
evolution,  relation  to  socialism  and  its  racial  effects. 
In  Russia  she  startled  the  civilized  world  with  her 
reports  of  the  Slavic  practice  of  persecuting  the 
Jewish  citizens  of  the  country.  She  also  gained 
membership  in  the  World's  Geographic  Society  be- 
cause of  her  scientific  discussion  of  the  causes,  pres- 
ent effect,  and  probable  future  effect,  of  those  bar- 
barities. She  made  an  exhaustive  study  of  Direct 
Legislation  in  Switzerland;  and  twenty  years  later 
helped  to  induce  the  voters  of  the  State  of 
Washington  to  enact  the  Initiative,  Referendum 
and  Recall  into  laws  for  their  own  guidance.  She 
drilled  classes  in  botany  during  four  vacational  sea- 
sons in  the  Catskill  mountains,  to  the  end  that  her 
pupils  gained  a  familiar  acquaintance  with  every 
tree,  plant  and  wild  flower  in  those  classic  hills.  On 
the  Pacific  Coast  she  wrote  informatively  and  au- 
thoritatively regarding  the  bubonic  plague,  includ- 
ing instructions  in  ways  and  means  to  exterminate 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-one 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

fleas — the  agency  of  the  spread  of  the  terrible  Asiat- 
ic scourge.  In  Seattle  her  writing  on  sanitation 
prompted  the  Board  of  Health  of  that  city  to  repro- 
duce her  discussions  in  pamphlet  form  and  distri- 
bute them  in  such  quantities  that  a  copy  reached 
every  citizen  of  the  community. 

But,  perhaps,  her  greatest  successes  in  science 
were  her  discoveries  and  disclosures  regarding  the 
psychology  of  ants.  Of  these  achievements,  she 
herself  writes: 

"My  summers  were  devoted  generally  to  biolog- 
ical pursuits;  and  from  1900  to  1907  I  was  a  lec- 
turer as  well  as  an  investigator  at  the  Marine  Bio- 
logical Laboratory  at  Wood's  Hole,  Massachusetts. 
Perhaps  I  am  the  only  person  who  knows  that  some 
centuries  from  now  my  name  will  linger  in  the 
scientific  world  because  of  my  discoveries  of  the 
distribution  and  localization  of  the  sense  of  smell 
in  ants.  These  discoveries,  made  in  1901.  have 
not  been  confuted  nor  confirmed  by  any  other 
worker.  No  one  during  the  last  decade  has  under- 
taken the  prolonged,  unhurried,  painstaking  experi- 
ments necessary  either  to  the  contradiction  or  con- 
firmation of  my  published  statements.  Seven 
years  work  on  the  ants,  with  proof  that  they  can 
remember  a  smell  for  at  least  three  years  and  with 
other  new  and  interesting  facts  concerning  these 
insects,  that  come  next  to  man  in  exhibitions  of 
mentality,  brought  variety  and  delight  into  my  sum- 
mers." 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-two 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Scientist 

An  article  on  the  Memory  of  Ants,  published 
in  the  New  York  Tribune,  December  25,  1 904,  is  a 
fairly  good  description  of  Miss  Fielde's  chief  con- 
tribution to  contemporaneous  scientific  discovery 
of  that  day: 

"The  ant  is  a  constant  source  of  wonder.  As  in 
the  case  of  Goldsmith's  pedagogue,  still  the  wonder 
gr©ws  that  one  small  head  can  carry  all  he  knows. 
The  ant  has  so  many  human  attributes  it  is  difficult 
to  imagine  them  all  compacted  in  a  little  six-legged 
dumb-bell,  not  over  a  third  of  an  inch  long.  Al- 
though ants  were  a  source  of  interest  long  before 
the  unknown  old  Hebrew  advised  the  sluggard  to 
go  to  the  ant,  consider  her  ways  and  be  wise,  new 
facts  are  constantly  being  discovered  about  this  in- 
dustrious and  intelligent  insect.  It  is  now  declared 
that  it  has  the  power  of  recognition,  or  the  faculty 
of  remembering  for  an  extended  period.  Accord- 
ing to  Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde,  of  this  city,  who  has 
been  studying  ants  scientifically  for  five  years,  they 
can  remember  for  a  period  of  at  least  three  years. 
Miss  Fielde,  who  does  a  great  deal  of  work  at 
Wood's  Hole,  Mass.,  is  the  inventor  of  a  nest  which 
entirely  deceives  the  ant  and  makes  it  think  it  is  in 
its  own  native  haunt.  By  means  of  it  she  has  been 
able  to  isolate  and  observe  a  given  ant,  or  colony  of 
ants,  continuously  for  a  period  of  three  years.  The 
nest  is  an  ingenious  little  house  of  glass,  divided  into 
compartments  or  rooms.  As  the  insects  love  dark- 
ness rather  than  light,  but  for  no  ignoble  reasons, 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

the  nest  is  covered  with  opaque  paper  and  kept  in 
a  cabinet. 

"The  sense  of  smell  seems  to  be  the  ant's  leading 
sense,  as  the  sense  of  hearing  is  that  of  the  mole, 
the  sense  of  touch  that  of  the  caterpillar,  and  the 
sense  of  sight  that  of  the  eagle.  It  was  through 
this  sense  that  Miss  Fielde  worked  to  determine  the 
ant's  ability  to  remember.  The  ant  seems  to  be  en- 
dowed with  an  immense  variety  of  odors.  There 
are  enough  odors  among  them  to  puzzle  the  ordina- 
ry human  nose.  Apparently  each  queen  has  a  dif- 
ferent odor.  All  her  descendants  have  the  same 
odor  when  they  are  brought  into  existence,  but 
when  they  grow  older  their  odors  change,  so  that 
ants  two  years  old  have  a  different  odor  than  that 
they  had  at  one  year,  those  of  three  years  have  still 
another,  and  so  on  till  they  die.  Each  nest  has  its 
own  odor,  the  larvae  and  pupae  have  their  special 
odors,  and  each  individual  ant  has  an  odor  that  dis- 
tinguishes it  from  any  other  ant.  When  an  ant 
meets  a  neighbor,  it  does  not  recognize  it  by  its  ap- 
pearance, but  by  its  odor.  When  two  ants  meet 
they  immediately  begin  to  feel  each  other  over 
with  their  arm-like  antennae  feelers.  One  would 
imagine  that  they  were  caressing  each  other,  but  it 
is  not  so.  They  are  finding  out  each  other's  odors. 
If  the  odors  are  not  familiar  then  a  fight  ensues,  for 
there  is  no  neutral  ground  in  the  ant  world.  If  an 
ant  is  not  a  member  of  the  home  group,  it  is  an 
enemy.  The  ant  code  is  'Fight  all  strangers  on 
smell  and  begin  first.' 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-four 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Scientist 

44 Ants  fight  with  the  tenacity  of  bulldogs.  Once 
they  have  grappled,  it  is  fight  until  one  of  the  com- 
batants is  killed  or  so  badly  maimed  that  it  can  fight 
no  longer.  Miss  Fielde  has  seen  two  fight  continu- 
ously for  eighteen  hours.  The  animosity  which 
ants  display  towards  one  another  is  probably  due  to 
the  practice  of  the  tribes  of  raiding  each  other's 
nests  and  carrying  off  the  larvae  and  pupae.  These 
the  captors  rear  so  that  when  they  come  to  matur- 
ity they  may  work  for  them  as  slaves. 

4<Miss  Fielde,  by  experiment,  has  discovered  how 
the  ants  detect  the  different  smells.  The  feelers 
are  divided  into  joints.  Each  of  these  joints  is 
equipped  to  detect  a  different  odor.  This  she  dis- 
covered by  a  process  of  elimination.  With  the  most 
delicate  of  surgical  instruments  she  performed  op- 
erations on  the  antennae  of  some  of  her  ants.  From 
the  antennae  of  one  ant  she  would  take  off  the  first 
joint  and  watch  to  see  what  odor  the  ant  failed  to 
recognize  which  it  had  previously  known.  Two 
joints  were  removed  from  another,  three  from  a 
third  and  so  on.  By  this  method  she  found  that 
with  the  end  of  the  feelers  the  ant  could  recognize 
the  odor  of  its  home;  that  with  the  next  joint  it  was 
able  to  recognize  its  adult  blood  relations.  The 
third  joint  guided  it  home.  It  is  with  this  joint  that 
it  scents  its  own  track.  This  track  it  pursues  with 
greater  certainty  than  a  bloodhound  does  a  trail. 
It  can  detect  this  scent  through  obstacles  of  relative- 
ly great  thickness.  With  the  fourth  joint  it  recog- 
nizes the  young  of  its  own  species.  The  last  joint 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

informed  it  if  the  ant  it  met  with  was  an  enemy  or 
not. 

"Knowing  that  the  ants  would  fight  if  they  did 
not  recognize  the  odor,  she  put  into  a  nest  of  ants, 
which  she  had  had  for  three  years,  two  queens  with 
their  old  wild  nest.  Although  these  ants  had  been 
shut  off  from  all  intercourse  with  any  other  ants 
from  their  old  home  colony  throughout  this  period, 
they  indicated  that  they  remembered  the  odor  of 
their  old  home  queen  by  receiving  her  into  full  fel- 
lowship immediately.  Miss  Fielde  made  many 
other  experiments  indicating  that  ants  could  re- 
member the  odors  they  had  once  been  familiar  with. 

"Miss  Fielde  has  a  happy  family  of  ants.  In  one 
particular  nest  she  had  four  different  species,  of 
which  some  are  much  larger  than  others  and  fully 
capable  of  'wiping  up  the  earth*  with  the  latter. 
The  different  species  would  have  fought  if  they 
hadn't  been  brought  up  together.  They  had  been 
put  together  before  they  were  twelve  hours  old, 
and  there  had  never  been  a  quarrel  between  them. 
One  of  these  species  was  a  strong,  hairy  ant,  one 
of  the  largest  of  American  ants.  Then  there  are  a 
number  of  gray  ants  of  the  kind  that  live  under 
stones  in  the  meadows.  These  are  very  gentle,  and 
other  species  often  make  slaves  of  them  by  raiding 
their  nests  and  stealing  their  larvae.  They  are 
such  industrious  workers  that  other  species  like  to 
keep  them.  They  remain  in  the  nests  and  turn  the 
eggs  and  do  work  for  their  captors  without  protest. 
The  third  species  were  chubby,  snuff-colored  ants 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-six 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Scientist 

of  smaller  size.  These  have  such  a  strong  mater- 
nal instinct  that  when  danger  seems  to  threaten,  as 
when  the  cover  of  the  nest  is  raised,  they  grab  the 
big  fellows  by  the  nose  and  pull  them  around  as  if 
they  were  eggs  which  they  were  trying  to  secrete 
in  some  safe  spot.  They  are  actually  able  to  pull 
the  big  fellows  along  bodily.  One  of  their  pleasures 
is  riding  on  these  same  big  ant's  backs.  The  fourth 
species  were  little  brown  ants,  smaller  than  any  of 
the  others. 

"In  all  ant  communities  there  are  three  kinds  of 
ants — the  queen,  which  lays  the  eggs;  the  spinster 
ants,  which  care  for  the  larvae  and  pupae,  and  the 
males,  which  are  very  much  like  the  loafers  who 
stand  around  in  country  grocery  stores,  their  hands 
in  their  pockets,  going  home  only  at  meal  time  to 
enjoy  the  food  provided  for  them  by  their  women 
folks.  The  males  do  nothing,  and  even  expect  to 
be  fed  by  the  working  spinsters.  The  queen  may 
live  to  be  fourteen  or  fifteen  years  old,  and  workers 
are  known  to  have  lived  six  years. 

"In  the  course  of  her  experiments,  Miss  Fielde 
says  she  has  found  that  ants  are  blind  to  all  rays 
of  light  except  the  ultra  violet,  or  those  known  to 
the  photographer  as  actinic  rays.  As  soon  as  a  glass 
which  transmitted  only  the  actinic  rays  was  placed 
over  the  ants,  they  proceeded  to  carry  all  of  their 
young  from  beneath  it  as  if  they  feared  impending 
peril.  Just  why  they  did  it,  Miss  Fielde  could  not 
discover,  as  that  kind  of  rays  seemed  to  have  no 
effect  upon  the  health  of  the  community.  As  a  re- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

suit  of  collaborating  with  Professor  George  H. 
Parker,  of  Harvard  University,  to  determine  if  they 
could  hear,  she  declares  that  ants  are  not  sensitive 
to  vibrations  received  through  the  air. 

"Individual  ants  have  different  temperaments, 
according  to  Miss  Fielde.  'Ants  of  some  species 
are  as  varied  in  character  as  human  beings,'  she 
said  the  other  day.  'Some  are  irascible,  others  do- 
cile; some  have  strong  maternal  instincts,  while 
others  dislike  the  care  of  the  young ;  some  like  quiet 
home  life,  while  others  like  to  go  afield  and  roam 
about;  some  learn  more  quickly  than  others  the 
things  which  I  wish  them  to  do.  Ants  keep  them- 
selves and  their  young  scrupulously  clean.  I  have 
seen  an  ant,  when  she  wanted  to  be  specially  well 
groomed,  catch  hold  of  another  ant  by  the  leg  and 
make  her  lick  her  back,  which  she  could  not  reach 
herself.  If  the  other  ant  got  tired  and  tried  to  get 
away,  she  would  catch  it  again  and  compel  it  to 
remain  until  the  work  was  done  thoroughly.  When 
their  young  get  soiled,  they  will  pick  them  up,  as 
much  as  to  say,  "You  naughty  boy"  and  forcibly 
wipe  them  clean  in  the  nest.  The  ants  carefully 
remove  all  debris  of  an  unclean  character  from 
their  nurseries/ 

"It  is  hard  to  believe  that  ants  have  not  some  of 
the  emotions  of  human  beings.  Miss  Fielde  has 
observed  instances  of  grief  at  the  loss  of  compan- 
ions which  were  pathetic.  She  had  two  little  spin- 
ster ants  that  had  lived  alone  all  their  lives.  She 
put  ant  eggs  into  their  compartment  for  them  to 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-eight 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Scientist 

care  for.  Then  she  removed  one,  to  see  what  the 
other  would  do — if  she  would  appear  to  be  lone- 
some. The  one  which  was  left  forsook  her  care  of 
the  young,  to  which  she  had  been  previously  much 
devoted,  and  spent  the  time  searching  for  her  lost 
companion  all  through  the  nest.  The  next  day  her 
companion  was  returned  and  there  was  evidence  of 
great  rejoicing.  Both  ants  again  turned  their  at- 
tention to  the  young.  The  other  story  is  that  of  a 
widowed  queen.  She  refused  to  leave  the  side  of 
the  dead  king,  remaining  beside  its  body  for  six 
days,  when  it  began  to  disintegrate.'* 

Under  the  caption  of  "A  Woman  of  Achieve- 
ment," a  notable  woman  magazine  writer  recently 
published  a  tribute  to  Miss  Fielde,  which  contained 
some  strongly  characteristic  facts.  The  excerpts 
are  here  reproduced  as  follows : 

"Adele  M.  Fielde,  author,  linguist,  scholar,  scien- 
tist, friend — has  solved  triumphantly  the  problems 
life  has  presented  to  her,  and  by  her  own  efforts  has 
reached  a  position  that  is  unique.  Her  career  is  in- 
spiring because  of  achievement  in  the  past  and  be- 
cause of  promise  in  the  future. 

"It  was  my  good  fortune  to  discover  Miss  Fielde 
at  a  time  when  I  suddenly  realized  how  ignorant  I 
was  of  certain  matters  that  had  become  necessary 
to  my  work.  I  made  inquiries  concerning  an  in- 
structor, an  expert  in  these  desirable  acquirements. 
What  were  they?  They  included  the  art  of  conver- 
sation— of  learning  how  to  get  the  best  out  of  oth- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Sixty-nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ers  and  out  of  myself  as  well.  A  knowledge  of  par- 
liamentary law  was  another  means  to  widen  influ- 
ence and  usefulness,  and  I  sought  for  a  teacher  who 
had  mastered  and  who  could  impart  these  branches 
of  equipment.  It  was  not  easy  to  secure  the  aid  I 
needed.  After  several  futile  attempts,  I  met  a 
friend  at  Mrs.  John  D.  Rockefeller's  house  who  told 
me  of  a  woman  who  'evened  up  everybody.' 

'  'Show  me  her  abode,'  I  requested;  and  the  very 
next  day  I  betook  myself  to  one  of  Miss  Fielde's 
haunts. 

"A  sign  read:  'League  for  Political  Education.' 
It  seemed  to  me  that  the  very  name  implied  enough 
to  scare  one  of  ordinary  attainments.  However, 
the  entrance  was  not  so  impressive  as  the  name 
and  I  ventured  to  ask  the  attendant  for  Miss  Fielde. 
'You  will  find  her  up  one  flight,'  was  the  reply. 
'But  don't  make  any  noise;  she  doesn't  like  noise.' 
Now  I  had  no  desire  or  intention  of  being  noisy,  so 
with  a  glance  of  disapproval,  I  proceeded  on  my 
way.  I  hesitated  in  the  corridor,  lest  some  awe- 
inspiring  person  might  suddenly  appear  and  ask 
me  what  I  wanted.  Not  meeting  any  such  obstacle, 
I  proceeded  up  the  winding  marble  stairway  and 
found  myself  in  a  room  with  shelves  of  books  which 
seemed  to  glare  at  me.  Near  the  door  a  lady-like 
little  woman  sat  at  a  desk.  She  arose  and  said  'Have 
you  your  ticket?'  I  couldn't  quite  make  out  from 
her  manner  whether  she  knew  I  had  or  not,  so  I 
replied,  'I  haven't  it  with  me.'  She  then  gently  took 
me  by  the  arm  and  led  me  to  another  door,  saying, 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy 


Miss  Fielde  as  a  Scientist 

'Please  bring  your  ticket  next  time,  to  be  punched; 
be  very  quiet  as  you  enter  for  Miss  Fielde  is  now 
lecturing  on  ants/  Merciful  heavens!  Ants!  Ants! 
This  struck  me  so  positively  ludicrous  that  I  nearly 
laughed  aloud,  surely  I  hadn't  come  to  hear  a  treatise 
on  ants,  and,  in  fact,  I  could  only  think  that  per- 
haps Miss  Fielde  was  instructing  her  audience 
(which  was  almost  entirely  of  women)  how  to  care 
for,  or  be  kind  to  one's  relatives. 

"Not  at  all!  In  a  few  moments  the  members 
were  invited  to  witness  a  battle  which  was  going 
on  in  one  of  the  apartments  of  the  lecturer's  ant- 
house.  I  joined  them  and  before  I  knew  it  I  was 
charmed  not  only  with  Miss  Fielde's  personality, 
but  with  the  evidence  of  the  scientific  study  and 
patient  research  which  she  had  made  concerning 
the  habits,  food  and  customs  of  ants,  which  hereto- 
fore seemed  to  me  to  be  so  little  and  and  insignifi- 
cant. Never  again  would  I  trample  down,  as  I  had 
done  so  many  times,  a  little  ant-hill  just  to  see  the 
lively  little  insects  scatter  about  with  anxious  speed, 
striving  to  rebuild  their  crushed  home.  I  had  learn- 
ed something  but  not  exactly  what  I  had  come  for. 

"After  the  lecture  I  made  known  my  errand. 
Within  a  few  days  I  was  deep  in  the  study  of  the 
adaptation  of  rules  and  methods  for  the  proper  gov- 
ernment of  corporate  bodies  and  the  easiest  way 
of  systematizing  the  work  of  organization,  the 
framing  of  constitutions,  etc. 

"From  that  time  Miss  Fielde  has  never  ceased  to 
be  a  guiding  star.  Her  judgment  is  absolutely  safe 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-one 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

and  following  her  advice  will  not  involve  one  in 
difficulties.  When  giving  advice,  by  the  way,  she 
usually  ascertains  just  about  what  you  intend  to 
do  anyway  and  then  shows  you  the  best  way  to  ac- 
complish your  own  purpose.  *  *  * 

"Miss  Fielde' s  wonderful  development  started 
with  a  bereavement.  A  beautiful  romance  made 
happy  her  early  days  and  its  tragic  ending  was 
heart-breaking.  *  *  * 

"Miss  Fielde  will  always  be  remembered  by  those 
who  knew  her  as  the  woman  who  was  not  afraid 
to  'Follow  Through/  ' 


Page  Two  Hundred  Serenty-two 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-FIVE 
Her  Religious  Beliefs 

MISS  FIELDE  was  intensely  religious.  She 
regarded  religion  as  the  most  important  de- 
partment of  man's  economy,  defining  it,  as 
she  did,  to  be  the  * 'relation  of  man  to  God.'*  How- 
ever, in  later  life,  she  came  to  grow  away  from  her 
belief  in  it  as  an  abstract  quality.  She  preferred  to 
think  that  our  progress  towards  the  Kingdom  to 
Come  depended  more  on  moral  evolution  than  up- 
on religious  covenant.  Because  of  this  feeling  she 
became  impatient  with  church  creeds,  almost  intol- 
erant. It  was  her  thought  that  creed  has  a  dwarfing 
effect  upon  the  growth  of  religion,  limiting  the 
greater  benefit  that  might  be  derived  from  church 
influence. 

She  believed  in  Christianity  as  the  ultima  tliule 
of  moral  development.  In  her  opinion  the  time 
would  come  when  Love  and  Cooperation  would 
succeed  Natural  Selection  and  Survival  of  the  Fit- 
test as  Nature's  method  of  developing  the  human 
being;  and  that  differences  of  human  opinion 
would  in  time  be  adjusted  by  applying  the  science 
of  peace  instead  of  through  the  practice  of  the  arts 
of  war.  Her  faith  in  humanity  prompted  her  to  be- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

lieve  that  the  race  is  rapidly  approaching  the  Chris- 
tian ideal,  despite  occasional  reversions  to  type, 
like  instances  of  the  present  world-war. 

She  was  a  profound  student  of  the  Bible,  having 
translated  large  portions  of  it  into  the  Chinese 
language  for  the  enlightenment  of  her  native 
proselytes.  Her  belief  or  disbelief  regarding  the 
truth  of  the  Scriptures,  she  seldom  discussed.  It  is 
safe  to  say,  however,  that  she  did  not  regard  that 
compilation  as  the  infallible  work  of  divine  inspira- 
tion. Moreover,  she  was  inclined  to  the  opinion 
that  the  Book  contained  many  chronological  errors 
and  not  a  few  scientific  absurdities.  The  Book  of 
Genesis  she  looked  upon  as  the  product  of  the  im- 
agination of  a  primitive  tribe,  poetic  but  not  true. 
At  one  time  she  spoke  of  the  Bible  as  a  book  con- 
taining great  wisdom  but  imperfect  knowledge.  In 
one  of  her  lectures  she  referred  to  the  Ten  Com- 
mandments as  a  wonderful  code  for  the  time  in 
which  it  was  written,  but  wholly  insufficient  for 
the  needs  of  the  complex  civilization  of  the  present 
day.  "The  Law  of  Moses,"  she  said,  "is  entirely 
negative,  nearly  every  provision  beginning  with 
the  words,  'Thou  shalt  not/  devoted  almost  exclu- 
sively to  enjoining  us  from  wrong-doing.  What 
we  now  need  is  something  more  positive,  some- 
thing that  will  point  out  the  way  of  duty,  some- 
thing that  will  instruct  us  in  what  we  shall  do." 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-four 


Her  Religious  Beliefs 

The  synoptic  Gospels  she  was  disposed  to  regard 
as  true  in  all  essential  particulars.  The  art  of  liter- 
ary criticism,  she  thought,  has  reached  such  a  stage 
of  perfection  that  error  in  the  statement  of  fact  is 
readily  discovered.  True,  some  incongruous  state- 
ments have  been  interpolated  into  the  traditional 
account  of  the  personality,  character  and  works  of 
Jesus  by  several  compilers  of  the  New  Testament; 
but  the  spurious  parts  are  very  apparent  and  do  not 
affect  the  truth  of  the  text  as  a  whole.  She  be- 
lieved that  the  Master  did  perform  the  so-called 
miracles  just  as  He  is  reported  to  have  done;  but 
she  was  not  disposed  to  dignify  those  acts  with  the 
degree  of  importance  that  orthodox  believers  usual- 
ly give  them.  In  her  opinion  the  Savior  was  not 
necessarily  endowed  with  any  supernatural  power 
or  aided  by  any  supernatural  agency.  The  sup- 
posed acts  of  changing  water  into  wine ;  walking  on 
the  waters ;  and  feeding  the  multitude  of  five  thou- 
sand with  the  **seven  loaves  and  a  few  small 
fishes,'*  can  be  explained,  she  thought,  by  hypnot- 
ism; healing  the  sick,  restoring  sight  to  the  blind, 
and  life  to  the  dead,  could  be  accounted  for  by  the 
possession  of  abnormal  psychic  power ;  calming  the 
storm  at  sea  may  be  attributed  to  a  coincidence — 
possibly  the  gale  had  reached  its  point  of  subsidence 
just  at  the  time  the  command  was  expressed. 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Her  appreciation  of  the  personality  and  character 
of  Jesus  is  well  expressed  in  a  letter  to  a  friend, 
written  in  1895.  In  this  she  says: 

"The  person  who  has  lived  in  this  world  who 
seems  to  me  the  one  that  I  should  like  above  all 
others  to  be  permanently  near,  is  Christ.  I  am  ut- 
terly unorthodox,  taking  the  creed  of  any  church, 
Protestant,  Catholic  or  Greek,  as  a  standard.  I  do 
not  highly  esteem  churches  of  any  faith.  But  when 
I  pass  out  of  this  life  I  expect  to  immediately  in- 
quire for  the  Man  of  Nazareth.  I  have  a  conviction 
that  He  will  be  accessible,  and  that  the  things  and 
persons  that  I  really  care  most  for  will  all  be  where 
He  is,  and  where  I  am  going  to  be.  I  have  no  doubt 
that  Confucius  and  Buddha,  both  of  whom  were 
honest  truth-seekers,  and  who  are  no  more  repre- 
sented by  their  present  followers  than  is  Christ,  will 
be  in  fellowship  with  Him.  I  believe  that  a  vast 
multitude  out  of  each  country  and  language  and 
age  and  creed  will  have  met  there;  and  most  of 
them  will  have  come  because  they  were  like  Him 
without  knowing  it;  like  Him  in  certain  essentials 
that  are  not  mentioned  in  the  creeds,  but  are  com- 
monly overlooked.  I  have  really  come  to  enjoy  re- 
ligion. I  have  a  creed  I  can  heartily  believe  in  all 
its  details ;  one  that  offends  neither  my  intellect,  nor 
my  heart  nor  my  common-sense.  This  creed 
prompts  me  to  believe  that  you,  whose  creed  seems 
to  me  to  be  utterly  unreasonable,  will  in  the  happy 
future  be  my  friend  in  Heaven,  just  as  really  as 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-six 


Her  Religious  Beliefs 

you  are  now  in  this  poor  life  that  seems  such  an  un- 
heavenly  arrangement. 

A  letter,  written  by  Miss  Fielde  from  Swatow  in 
1887,  to  a  member  of  the  Philadelphia  Academy  of 
Natural  Sciences,  presents  some  illumining 
thoughts  regarding  her  religious  impressions,  atti- 
tude towards  church  creeds,  ideas  of  immortality, 
and  admiration  for  truth.  Excerpts  from  the  letter 
are  here  published  for  the  first  time: 

"The  art  of  the  old  masters  is  not  equalled  by 
any  moderns.  More  than  that,  you  will  never  see 
art  at  its  highest  except  in  Europe.  Oh,  the  sculp- 
tures of  Greece  and  old  Rome !  In  a  basalt  lion  that 
crouches  in  the  Vatican,  one  can  see  the  muscles 
contract  under  the  skin  and  quiver  while  gathering 
for  the  spring  upon  the  prey.  And,  though  the 
prey  is  invisible,  one  knows  that  it  is  human.  In 
the  Capitoline  Museum,  a  little  girl  holds  a  white 
dove  to  her  breast,  and  looks  over  her  shoulder  to- 
wards a  snake  that  is  rising  to  snatch  the  dove.  One 
knows  that  the  child  has  never  before  seen  a  snake 
or  heard  of  one;  that  she  is  Innocence  Personified. 
The  wondering  interest  with  which  she  gazes  at  the 
serpent;  the  pathetic  absence  of  distrust  of  it;  and 
the  timid  faith  in  its  capacity  for  good-fellowship; 
are  as  plain  as  her  delight  and  restfulness  in  the 
companionship  of  the  dove.  One  can  see  the  girl 
breathe  quietly;  can  see  the  throb  of  the  dove's 
heart ;  and  can  see  such  movement  of  muscle  under 
the  snake's  flecked  skin,  that  it  is  difficult  to  be- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

lieve  that  its  head  is  not  approaching  the  dove 
under  one's  very  eyes.  The  old  Greek  sculptors 
could  turn  a  thought  into  white  marble,  from  which 
it  would  for  thousands  of  years  go  out  and  move 
souls.  Nobody  knows  the  names  of  those  men 
who  could  thus  express  their  thoughts.  The  mat- 
ter that  was  them  has,  since  it  was  them,  taken  in- 
numerable shapes.  Their  lives;  their  histories; 
their  hopes;  their  sorrows;  all  that  they  had;  has 
passed  into  oblivion.  But  who  can  truly  say  that 
they  do  not  still  live  in  this  world.  They  stir  emo- 
tions ;  they  win  affection  and  admiration ;  they  con- 
vey ideas;  they  are  powers  that  influence  human 
weal.  Their  souls  are  immortal  among  men.  I  am 
a  believer  in  another  sort  of  immortality;  but  if, 
like  John  Burroughs,  I  believed  in  no  immortality 
besides  this  sort,  I  should  feel  that  sound  reason  for 
effort  still  existed;  and  that  this  sort  of  immortality 
was  real.  If  I  believed  in  no  future  life,  no  heaven, 
no  hell,  no  God  beyond  Nature  and  no  religion  but 
the  Law  of  Duty,  I  do  not  think  I  should  in  my  out- 
ward self  be  markedly  different  from  what  I  am. 
Cogent  reasons  for  all  good  works,  abundant  stim- 
ulus towards  being  our  best  selves,  infinite  argu- 
ment against  evil,  lie  outside  of  theology  and  creed. 
I  can  see  that  a  man  may  be  utterly  an  agnostic,  and 
yet  have  reasons  for  being  completely  good  in  all 
the  relations  of  life,  and  earnestly  devoted  to  such 
works  as  being  an  earthly  immortelle.  I,  who  am 
not  an  agnostic,  can  see  that  John  Burroughs  may 
be  one  and  yet  have  as  strong  reasons  for  righteous- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-eight 


Her  Religious  Beliefs 

ness  as  have  I,  and  as  real  a  hope  of  eternal  exist- 
ence as  have  I.  If  any  of  us  are  to  be  holy  and  im- 
mortal, then  holiness  and  immortality  are  essential- 
ly natural  and  sin  and  death  are  essentially  un- 
natural. 

"Your  account  of  the  fray  between  Dr.  M —  and 
Professor  H —  was  intensely  interesting.  The  fact 
which  Dr.  M —  stated  that  'to  have  anything  to  do 
with  the  teaching  of  the  doctrine  of  evolution  might 
compromise  him  with  his  congregation,*  is  hardly 
a  sound  reason  why  evolution  should  not  be  taught. 
Truth  often  compromises,  in  a  worldly  way,  its 
first  promulgators ;  but  woe  to  the  world,  if  the 
discoverers  or  followers  of  truth  withhold  their 
knowledge  of  it  because  of  private  expediency.  I 
am  honestly  grieved  that  Dr.  M —  should  have  set 
forth  such  a  reason  for  objecting  to  professor  H — *s 
lecture.  Such  an  avowal  from  him  places  him  in 
the  position  of  a  charlatan  and  vitiates  his  claim  to 
be  either  a  true  scientist  or  a  true  Christian.  Let 
us  have  truth  though  the  heavens  fall! 

'To  change  the  subject:  A  powerful  argument 
on  the  side  of  Christianity  is,  for  me,  the  fact  that 
the  noblest  human  beings  I  have  known  have  been 
Christians.  Possibly  the  masses  of  Christians, 
apart  from  their  higher  civilization,  are  no  better 
than  Confucianists,  Buddhists,  or  Atheists.  In- 
deed, for  vindictiveness,  self-seeking  and  mean- 
ness, I  believe  the  so-called  Christian  churches  can 
furnish  models  for  any  outside  their  pale.  But 
there  remains  still  the  fact  that  the  highest  order  of 

Page  Two  Hundred  Seventy-nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

character  is  to  be  found  where  Christianity  has  in- 
fluenced its  development.  I  have  not  a  wide  ac- 
quaintance among  European  atheists  and  agnostics ; 
but  so  far  as  my  experience  has  taught  me,  I  should 
not  expect  to  find  among  them  the  highest  type  of 
manhood,  that  in  which  magnanimity,  unselfish- 
ness, and  truthfulness  were  most  perfectly  manifest- 
ed. The  ideal  man  will  always  sway  the  minds  of 
the  masses  more  than  any  man's  idea.  He  will  also 
be  a  stronger  argument  than  any  he  can  make  in 
favor  of  his  principles  and  doctrines." 

In  October,  1914,  Dr.  Sydney  Strong,  pastor  of 
the  Queen  Anne  Congregational  Church,  of  Seat- 
tle, invited  Miss  Fielde  to  join  him  in  an  undertak- 
ing to  create  a  body  of  one  hundred  persons  who 
would  agree  to  make  the  Sermon  of  the  Mount 
their  rule  of  life  and  guide  to  daily  conduct.  Miss 
Fielde  declined  the  invitation  in  the  following  sig- 
nificant letter: 

"Dear  Dr.  Strong: 

"I  have  read  very  thoughtfully  about  *A  Pro- 
posed Enterprise  for  the  Age.'  I  have  also  just 
read  again,  very  thoughtfully,  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount.  I  have  never  been  able  to  live  up  to  my 
own  interpretation  of  the  Sermon.  It  is  probable 
that  I  shall  fail  in  the  future  as  I  have  in  the  past. 

"The  precepts  of  the  Chinese,  the  Hindu,  the 
Greek,  the  Persian,  the  Moorish  teachers  have  en- 
tered into  my  ethical  creed  without  conflict  with  its 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty 


Her  Religious  Beliefs 

Hebrew  elements.  In  a  blundering  way,  I  follow 
the  Parsee  mandate  for  the  morning — 'This  day, 
will  I  speak,  think  and  do  only  that  which  promotes 
the  true  life/  Almost  every  day,  there  comes  to 
me  a  clearer  conception  of  the  true  life.  At  pres- 
ent that  conception  does  not  impel  me  to  unite  with 
any  organization  whatsoever.  As  a  member  of  the 
human  family,  I  am  pressed  with  the  practical 
needs  of  my  kindred.  I  cannot  assume  the  duty  of 
fixed-time  meetings,  or  any  of  the  machinery  that 
inevitably  comes  into  use  with  new  enterprises. 
Moreover,  I  am  pledged  to  certain  more  or  less  pub- 
lic undertakings  that  require  my  energies. 

"I  write  all  this,  hoping  that  you  will  truly  un- 
derstand why  I  do  not  join  in  such  a  fine  enterprise 
as  that  which  your  printed  papers  propose.  I  am 
glad  I  know  about  your  plan  and  I  wish  it  well.*' 

Miss  Fielde,  being  a  true  scientist,  believed  in 
immortality,  but  she  was  doubtful  if  an  individual 
soul  retained  its  identity  after  its  separation  from 
the  body.  In  an  appreciation  of  her,  written  by 
Mrs.  Adaline  M.  Payne  and  published  in  the  Rep- 
resentative of  Nevada,  Iowa,  Miss  Fielde  is  quoted 
as  saying: 

"When  one  who  is  in  the  seventies  considers  the 
future,  that  consideration  must  needs  extend  into 
another  world  than  this.  Having  studied  Bud- 
dhism, Confucianism,  Zoroastrianism,  as  well  as 
Christianity,  among  the  people  who  profess  to  be- 
lieve them,  I  became  wise  enough  to  know  that  I 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

do  not  know.  I  hope  and  trust.  Whatever  bit  of 
earth  I  chance  to  stand  upon,  it  is  a  bit  of  the  great 
world  that  I  love  as  God's  footstool.  In  any  place, 
at  any  moment,  still  loving  the  world  that  I  know 
so  well,  I  can  go  serenely  into  my  next  life,  hoping 
for  an  endless  existence  in  which  love  and  service 
will  be  an  unmixed  joy." 

Regarding  Miss  Fielde's  religious  convictions 
and  beliefs,  Rev.  William  K.  McKibben  made  the 
following  comments  at  a  memorial  service  held  for 
her  in  Seattle  soon  after  her  death: 

"For  people  whose  nature  compels  thinking 
the  missionary  service  does  not  offer  a  favorable 
field  for  traditionalism  in  religion.  Out  there  one's 
views  of  theology  and  one's  theories  regarding  the 
Bible  have  to  be  submitted  to  tests  of  actual  life 
such  as  are  less  often  met  here  at  home.  There  is 
many  a  religious  observance,  and  many  a  piece  of 
church  procedure,  which  passes  among  us  with- 
out challenge;  but  which,  when  examined  under 
the  white  light  of  truth  are  found  to  be  accretions 
upon  Christianity,  and  not  an  original  part.  These 
often  mar  instead  of  improving  the  sweet  gospel  of 
the  Man  of  Nazareth. 

"Like  some  other  missionaries  Miss  Fielde's  at- 
tention having  been  drawn  to  these  accretionary 
elements,  candor  compelled  her  to  submit  them  to 
the  supreme  test  of  inquiry  and  thought.  She  was 
nothing  if  not  a  thinker.  To  her  nothing  was  good 
because  it  was  old,  but  only  because  it  was  true. 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty-two 


Her  Religious  Beliefs 

It  is  not  in  the  least  strange  therefore,  that,  when 
in  the  course  of  time,  these  questionings  came  be- 
fore our  friend,  her  reaction  upon  them  was  ener- 
getic and  decisive.  Nor  is  it  strange  that  her  inten- 
sity of  conviction  carried  her  to  greater  lengths  and 
to  more  radical  conclusions  than  was  thought  nec- 
essary by  most  others  who  have  faced  the  same  is- 
sue. We  can  but  honor  her  stern  loyalty  to  con- 
viction. I  am  glad  to  know  that  the  old  faith  lived 
on  even  when  its  externalities  were  rejected,  and 
that  nearing  the  end  she  solemnly  recorded  herself 
as  a  religious  woman,  one  who  was  too  wise  to  say 
she  knew,  but  was  also  wise  and  strong  enough  to 
say  she  believed  and  she  trusted.  In  those  hymns 
of  the  soul  that  she  recorded  as  her  favorites  I  see 
once  more  the  essential  fervent  Christian  convic- 
tions of  her  early  happy  missionary  days  come  to 
expression." 


Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty-three 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-SIX 
Philosophy  and  Psychology 

THE  advancement  of  the  race  from  the  King- 
dom of  Earth  to  the  "Kingdom  to  Come," 
was  Miss  Fielde's  idea  of  the  purposes  of  hu- 
man existence.  In  fact,  she  thought  all  forms  of 
life  had  been  designed  with  this  destiny  in  view. 
In  her  opinion  human  progress  in  this  direction 
could  only  be  made  by  two  general  methods.  The 
first  by  marriage  and  production  of  children,  the  lat- 
ter in  sufficient  numbers  to  insure  the  race  against 
decline  and  with  such  regard  to  eugenic  breeding 
that  each  succeeding  generation  would  be  an  im- 
provement upon  the  parent  stock;  the  second  plan 
she  had  of  bringing  the  millennium  was  by  means 
of  social  service.  The  first,  however,  she  consid- 
ered the  greater  of  the  two,  offering,  as  it  did,  great- 
er facilities  for  self-sacrifice,  self -abnegation  and 
devotion  to  others — the  only  true  culture. 

The  bitter  disappointment  she  must  have  experi- 
enced from  being  obliged  to  abandon  the  plan  she 
regarded  as  the  most  potent  means  of  contributing 
to  the  world's  welfare,  is  suggested  in  a  letter  to  a 
girl  friend  whom  she  urged  to  look  forward  only 
to  a  life  that  contemplated  husband  and  children. 
"Whatever  else  women  may  do  in  the  world,*'  she 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty-four 


Philosophy  and  Psychology 

wrote,  " their  chief  and  enduring  hold  on  the  esteem 
of  the  human  family  is  attained  by  their  excellence 
as  mothers. 

"She  who  goes  into  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of 
death  three  or  four  times  in  the  course  of  her  exist- 
ence and  returns  each  time,  bringing  a  new  life  with 
her,  does  more  for  humanity  than  the  writer  of 
books,  the  opera  singer,  the  fine  artist,  the  skillful 
physician,  the  wise  voter  or  the  woman  in  public 
life,  useful  and  necessary  as  they  all  are. 

"The  spirit  of  the  pioneer  mother  should  abide 
in  all  women.  Sometimes  a  woman  who  has  no 
progeny,  has  to  take  a  State  as  her  brood,  and  that 
is  motherhood,  too.'* 

The  same  thought  is  contained  in  a  letter  to  a 
co-worker  in  scientific  pursuits,  written  while  she 
was  connected  with  the  League  for  Political  Educa- 
tion. She  says: 

"Each  day  I  teach  civil  government,  parliamen- 
tary usage  and  statute  law  to  a  hundred  and  fifty 
women.  I  am  not  utterly  devoted  to  my  work, 
doubtful  if  I  am  pointing  out  to  my  pupils  their 
highest  spheres  of  usefulness.  True,  they  are 
bright  and  winsome  women ;  but,  sometimes,  when 
I  look  into  the  sweet,  eager  and  tired  faces  of  that 
class,  I  silently  say — 'Oh,  you  dear,  aspiring,  stren- 
uous souls!  I  wish  that  every  one  of  you  was  the 
mother  of  seven  children  or  the  grandmother  of 
twelve;  and  that  you  had  your  lives  and  time  full 
of  honest,  healthy,  calm  domesticity/ 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty-five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"The  woman  who  has  interested  me  most,  is  one 
who  came  to  get  a  book  to  study,  because  her  boys 
were  growing  up  and  she  wanted  to  know  what 
would  and  should  interest  them;  but  she  could  not 
come  to  the  class,  because  she  always  made  it  a 
point  to  be  at  home  when  the  children  came  from 
school.  Of  course  it  is  much  better  to  overwork 
in  the  study  of  law  or  science  or  literature  than  to 
wreck  the  health  in  social  dissipation  and  nonsense. 
But,  well,  there  is  a  girl  in  my  class  who  is  about 
to  be  admitted  to  the  Bar.  She  has  worked  tre- 
mendously for  years,  and  has  denied  herself  every- 
thing else  for  the  sake  of  success  in  this.  She  is 
white,  thin,  and  on  the  verge  of  a  nervous  collapse. 
She  says  I  have  been  very  kind  to  her  and  useful. 
I  am  not  sure  but  I  will  be  more  useful  yet,  and  say 
to  her,  'My  dear  young  woman,  you  have  a  wrong 
idea  of  values.  Rest;  make  yourself  hearty  and 
happy;  fall  in  love  with  the  first  upright,  capable 
and  warm-hearted  young  fellow  that  shows  sense 
enough  to  admire  you ;  drop  your  law  into  the  first 
ditch  you  cross  with  him,  and  devote  your  fine 
feminine  brain  to  the  making  one  house  more 
heavenly  than  any  other  scrap  of  the  world/  ' 

About  middle  life,  Miss  Fielde  became  actively 
interested  in  Psychology,  especially  in  the  abnor- 
mal features  of  that  science.  She  knew  from  per- 
sonal experience  and  otherwise,  that  there  were 
forces  which  deeply  affect  humanity,  and  of  which 
natural  science  has,  as  yet,  made  no  satisfactory 

F!age  Two  Hundred  Eighty-six 


Philosophy  and  Psychology 

accounting.  She  had  witnessed  exhibitions  of  the 
various  phenomena  and  peculiar  manifestations  of 
Spiritism,  Theosophy,  Christian  Science,  Hindu 
Occultism  and  African  Fetishism,  and  was  eager  to 
gain  a  knowledge  of  the  causative  principle  of  these 
several  species  of  mysticism.  She  realized  that  mil- 
lions of  her  fellow-beings  believed  that  these  rec- 
ondite forces  were  manifestations  of  supernatural 
origin  or  of  spirit  visitation,  and  that  their  religious 
faith  and  hope  of  a  future  life  depended  largely 
upon  them. 

With  a  view  of  studying  this  subject  she  read 
Kant,  Swedenborg,  Bishop  Berkeley,  William 
James,  Munsterberg,  Thompson  Jay  Hudson,  Sir 
Oliver  Lodge,  James  H.  Hyslop  and  Mary  Baker 
Eddy.  She  also  read  the  voluminous  reports  of  the 
Societies  for  Psychical  Research  of  both  this  coun- 
try and  England,  as  well  as  many  other  books  and 
periodicals  devoted  to  psychology,  metaphysics, 
ontology  and  kindred  branches  of  study. 

She  accepted  Hudson's  modification  of  the  Kan- 
tian idea  of  the  subjective-objective  so  far  as  defini- 
tions were  concerned.  At  least  she  believed  that 
the  subjective  mind  was  in  reality  the  soul,  poten- 
tially perfect,  of  infinite  capacity,  and,  perhaps,  in- 
dependent of  the  laws  of  physical  nature.  But  her 
mind  was  never  fully  satisfied  as  to  the  real  relation 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty-seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

of  the  objective  to  the  subjective.  She  could  not 
decide  whether  the  objective  was  an  entity,  coor- 
dinate and  coeternal  with  the  subjective,  or  simply 
the  creation  and  subordinate  agency  of  the  latter. 
As  a  consequence  she  had  the  experience  common 
to  many  philosophers,  she  failed  to  classify  the 
phenomena  of  clairvoyance,  clair-audience,  levita- 
tion,  hypnotism  and  psychic  healing,  attributed  by 
some  to  the  supernatural  agency  of  disembodied 
spirits — called  spiritism,  and  by  others  to  the  super- 
normal activities  of  the  subjective — commonly 
described  as  "dual-personality." 

If  Miss  Fielde  reached  any  conclusion  regarding 
this  highly  interesting  question  during  her  life  time, 
it  was  not  disclosed.  However,  the  fact  that  her 
interest  continued  unabated  up  to  the  time  of  her 
death  is  known.  In  1 904  she  entered  into  a  com- 
pact with  Dr.  Anna  Lukins,  of  New  York,  which 
provided  that  the  first  of  the  two  to  die  would,  if 
possible,  return  in  spirit  and  endeavor  to  communi- 
cate with  the  survivor.  Each  wrote  the  message 
that  she  would  attempt  to  deliver  to  the  other, 
which  was  to  remain  a  secret  until  given  from  the 
spirit  world.  This  message  was  to  serve  to  identify 
the  spirit  bearing  it,  also  to  protect  the  recipient 
against  imposture  or  to  prevent  the  possibility  of 
the  proposed  communication  being  made  known 

Page  Two  Hundred  Eighty-eight 


Philosophy  and  Psychology 

by  means  of  telepathy  or  mind-reading.  The  mes- 
sage that  Miss  Fielde  prepared  she  placed  securely 
sealed  in  the  keeping  of  Dr.  James  H.  Hyslop,  a 
notable  scientist  and  educator,  the  then  head  of  the 
American  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  and  a 
personal  friend  of  Miss  Fielde.  Miss  Fielde  also 
made  a  written  statement  of  her  understanding 
with  Dr.  Lukins,  which,  with  a  copy  of  the  mes- 
sage that  the  latter  proposed  to  deliver,  is  now  in 
the  custody  of  the  executor  of  her  estate,  Mr. 
George  H.  Walker,  of  Seattle. 

Two  years  before  Miss  Fielde  died  she  entered 
into  a  similar  agreement  with  Mrs.  John  Trumbull, 
of  Seattle,  pass-words  having  a  personal  significance 
being  agreed  on  for  purposes  of  identification  rath- 
er than  written  messages.  Up  to  the  present  time 
no  message  has  been  received.  Dr.  Lukins 
died  within  a  year  of  Miss  Fielde's  demise  and  Mrs. 
Trumbull  still  waits  the  proposed  visitation. 

Many  of  Miss  Fielde's  experiments  in  testing  the 
theory  of  "dual-personality"  as  the  causative  prin- 
ciple of  abnormal  psychic  phenomena  are  highly  in- 
teresting. One  of  them  was  especially  so,  attract- 
ing, as  it  did,  the  attention  of  the  scientific  world. 
An  account  of  it  was  first  published  in  the  Ther- 
apeutic Gazette,  of  Philadelphia,  from  which  it 
was  copied  into  the  scientific  journals  of  England, 

Fage  Two  Hundred  Eighty-nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

France  and  Germany.  Her  own  account  of  the 
experiment  is  here  reprinted: 

"The  hashish  of  the  Arabs,  the  gunjah  of  the 
Hindus,  is  prepared  from  a  species  of  hemp,  Can- 
nabis  Indica,  grown  in  a  tropical  climate.  In  Siam 
this  plant,  called  kang  cha,  is  cultivated  in  gardens, 
and  the  spikes  of  minute  female  flowers,  densely 
surrounding  a  stalk  a  few  inches  in  length,  have  a 
general  resemblance  to  those  of  catmint.  They  are 
cut  immediately  after  inflorescence,  are  slightly 
dried,  and  are  commonly  sold  in  the  market  places 
at  about  four  cents  for  a  bunch  of  fifteen  stalks. 
The  natives  addicted  to  the  habit  smoke  these  flow- 
ers in  a  brass  pipe,  in  which  the  acrid  fumes  are 
forced  through  water  before  they  reach  the  mouth. 
The  immediate  and  temporary  effect  is  exhilaration 
or  delirium;  the  permanent  consequences  are  yel- 
lowness of  the  eyeballs,  pallor  and  greasiness  of  the 
skin,  flabbiness  of  muscle,  emaciation  and  gradual 
destruction  of  mind  and  body.  It  is  said  that  those 
of  the  European  race  are  less  susceptible  than  are 
the  Asiatics  to  its  elating  influence.  I  have  heard 
of  no  foreigner  in  East  India  who  has  the  hasheesh 
habit. 

"While  living  in  Siam  in  1868  I  saw  many  suf- 
ferers from  this  practice,  and  decided  to  test  upon 
myself  the  effect  of  the  narcotic.  I  was  at  a  small 
village  a  day's  journey  from  any  other  white  per- 
son, and  was  able  to  secure  myself  against  observa- 
tion or  interruption.  I  extemporized  a  pipe,  and 
smoked  six  thimblefuls  of  the  bang  cha.  The  smoke 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety 


Philosophy  and  Psychology 

was  stifling,  but  I  persevered  in  puffing  until  I  felt 
luxuriously  quiet.  About  ten  minutes  after  laying 
down  the  pipe,  I  suddenly  became  conscious  of  dual 
being.  My  usual  self  was  awake,  was  aware  of  all 
my  actual  circumstances,  was  perceiving  with  clear- 
ness and  recalling  with  precision  the  facts  of  my 
commonplace  existence.  I  knew  that  I  was  lying 
on  my  back  in  a  chamber  of  a  native  house  at  ten 
o'clock  at  night,  and  was  observing  with  open  eyes 
the  details  of  my  familiar  surroundings.  There 
was  complete  continuity  of  thought,  and  perfect 
cognizance  of  the  mental  effect  of  the  herb. 

"My  double  was  standing  in  an  arched  and  pil- 
lared hall,  whose  walls,  furniture  and  draperies 
were  all  encrusted  with  tinted  gems,  that  shone  with 
soft  and  exceeding  brilliancy.  Such  strength  and 
harmony  in  color,  such  grace  and  grandeur  in  pro- 
portions, such  intensity  and  mildness  in  illumina- 
tion the  sane  imagination  never  conceived.  In  the 
midst  of  this  radiance  and  beauty  I  was  infinitely 
joyous.  Every  atom  in  me  quivered  in  unspeak- 
able spiritual  bliss  and  I  said  This  is  the  house  not 
made  with  hands  and  I  am  now  in  Heaven.' 

"Duality  presently  ceased  as  suddenly  as  it  be- 
gan, and  then  after  a  few  minutes  returned  with  a 
new  phase.  My  muscles,  especially  those  of  the 
eyelids  and  mouth,  twitched  spasmodically.  My 
appearance  must  have  been  that  of  one  in  an  epilep- 
tic fit,  but  my  mind  remained  clear,  and  took  note 
that  the  muscular  contractions  were  simultaneous 
with  the  quacking  of  some  ducks  under  my  win- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-one 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

dow.  My  second  self  was  an  automatic  musical  in- 
strument, a  complex  arrangement  of  strings  and 
keys,  trembling  in  rapture  while  sending  forth  en- 
chanting melody  that  resembled  sometimes  a  famil- 
iar, sometimes  an  unknown  tune.  The  diapason 
was  superb,  and  every  note  was  a  throb  of  exulta- 
tion. I  took  no  heed  of  moments,  but  when  the  in- 
strument ceased  playing  I  fell  into  a  deep  sleep,  fol- 
lowed by  a  slight  lassitude  on  the  following  day. 

"A  fortnight  afterward  I  repeated  the  experiment 
in  the  daytime.  Before  I  had  finished  smoking,  I 
began  to  respire  loudly  and  with  gaspings,  accom- 
panied with  violent  but  painless  involuntary  con- 
traction of  the  muscles.  Again  I  entered  the  separ- 
ate states  of  consciousness,  I  was  at  once  awake, 
asleep,  awakening  and  falling  asleep.  As  a  cord 
may  swing  so  quickly  between  two  different  points 
as  to  appear  to  be  two  different  cords,  each  com- 
plete at  the  limit  of  vibration,  so  I  passed  with  such 
rapidity  from  sleeping  to  waking  and  from  waking 
to  sleeping,  that  thought  and  dream  were  alike  in 
consciousness.  My  condition  was  neither  pleasur- 
able nor  painful,  but  was  intensely  strange  and  in- 
teresting to  me.  Out  of  it  my  dreaming  self  pass- 
ed into  another  state  leaving  my  waking  self  awake. 
My  duplicate  became  a  boundless  sea,  ravishingly 
cool,  utterly  free,  rising  in  vast  billows  under  an 
illimitable  sky,  and  feeling  in  every  drop  of  every 
wave  the  transport  of  my  own  pulsations.  Then  I 
became  a  continent  with  wide  meadows  and  verd- 
ant forests.  A  breeze  swept  over  me  and  rustled 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-two 


Philosophy  and  Psychology 

all  my  leaves ;  I  felt  my  vital  forces  waking  in  every 
blade  of  grass  and  every  spreading  tree,  sending 
them  gently  upward.  The  thrill  of  growth  was  in 
them  all,  and  growth  was  ecstasy.  This  ended  in 
profound  slumber. 

"A  few  days  later  I  smoked  the  usual  quantity 
of  kang  cha  with  no  noticeable  effect.  Whether  I 
made  use  of  a  stalk  in  which  the  resin  had  not  form- 
ed, or  whether  I  was,  from  some  occult  cause,  in- 
vincible to  its  influence,  I  am  unable  to  guess. 

"A  month  afterwards,  sitting  at  a  table,  pencil 
in  hand,  and  resolved  to  fasten  upon  paper  some 
of  the  marvelous  thoughts  that  came  to  me  while 
under  this  intoxication,  and  that  left  only  their  faint 
semblance  in  my  memory  when  the  excitation  ceas- 
ed, I  smoked  twice  as  much  ~kang  cha  as  before. 
In  a  few  minutes  I  lost  all  power  to  judge  of  the 
lapse  of  time.  I  walked  a  few  feet  to  close  a  door, 
and  seemed  to  have  been  millions  of  years  in  reach- 
ing it.  I  left  the  room  to  quiet  a  pet  dog  and  when 
I  returned  ages  appeared  to  have  rolled  away.  There 
was  not,  however,  in  my  case,  that  extension  of 
space,  as  well  as  of  time,  which  so  afflicted  Profes- 
sor Ludlow,  the  hasheesh-eater  of  Albany.  My 
room  had  only  its  usual  length.  My  mind  was  exalt- 
ed by  an  indescribable  increase  of  consciousness. 
Thoughts  crowded  upon  me  in  numbers  sufficient, 
could  they  have  been  recorded,  to  have  filled  the 
world  with  new  books.  The  causes  of  clairvoy- 
ance, hypnotism,  and  other  psychic  phenomena  be- 
came temporarily  plain  to  me.  I  strove  to  keep  the 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

knowledge  acquired  through  this  expanded  con- 
sciousness, but  during  the  eon  required  for  writing 
a  word  each  thought  was  swept  away  by  its  strong 
successor,  and  all  passed  in  a  current  that  I  could 
in  no  wise  control.  Meanwhile,  I  had,  not  dual, 
but  multiple  existence.  I  had  many  contemporar- 
ies, living  in  different  spheres  and  countries,  with 
distinct  occupations  and  experiences.  The  con- 
sciousness of  each  was  included  in  my  conscious- 
ness, and  each  was  myself.  Possibly  as  I  had,  in  dual 
being,  alternated  between  dreaming  and  waking 
with  such  swiftness  as  to  make  continuance  in  each 
seem  to  be  perpetual,  so  that  I  now  passed  from 
dream  to  dream  with  such  speed  as  to  make  several 
distinct  dreams  seem  each  to  be  unbroken.  If  par- 
allel threads  were  stretched  along  the  surface  of  a 
cylinder,  and  a  point  were  made  to  revolve  around 
the  cylinder  transversely,  while  it  was  at  the  same 
time  slightly  projected  along  the  threads,  the  spiral 
point  followed  by  the  point  would  form  a  close 
coil,  touching  every  one  of  the  threads  by  the  point 
successively.  If  the  threads  represented  lives  and 
the  flying  point  my  consciousness,  the  latter  might 
thus  touch  and  recognize  all  that  was  in  the  former. 
So  my  consciousness  seemed  to  speed  with  a  veloc- 
ity greater  than  that  of  light  through  an  eternity  of 
time,  and  to  include  and  apprehend  each  of  the  lives 
that  had  become  mine.  The  velocity  of  revolution 
was  so  great  that  no  appreciable  interval  lay  be- 
tween my  passing  from  one  life  to  the  same  again, 
and  so  each  life  seemed  continuous  in  my  conscious- 
ness. No  one  of  my  various  lives  was  more  im- 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-four 


Philosophy  and  Psychology 

pressive  than  the  others,  though  each  was  at  the 
time  as  real  to  me  as  my  present  one  now  is;  and 
when,  after  a  long  sleep,  I  awoke  with  only  my 
usual  limited  powers,  I  could  recall  the  full  story  of 
no  one  of  my  multiples.  A  page  that  I  had  written 
during  the  intoxication  contained  only  parts  of 
words,  and  words  having  little  grammatical  relation- 
ship to  one  another.  The  only  important  sentence 
having  a  subject  and  a  predicate  on  the  same  topic 
was  this,  'Spiritualism  comprehended/ 

"Forewarned  by  the  frightful  ruin  wrought  in 
others  by  the  hasheesh  habit,  I  had  resolved  before- 
hand that  I  would  limit  my  experiments  to  three. 
These  having  been  successfully  made,  I  never  again 
smoked  kang  clia,  and  during  the  years  that  have 
since  elapsed  I  have  thought  with  increasing  horror 
of  the  danger  I  then  incurred.  During  many  years 
thereafter,  drudgery  or  monotony  always  made  me 
unwisely,  meditate  on  this  beatification,  and  then, 
wisely,  on  its  accompanying  perdition. 

"I  have  now  written,  from  the  notes  I  made  twen- 
ty years  ago,  because  my  experiences,  here  truly, 
though  faintly  set  forth,  may  add  something  to  the 
data  from  which  the  problem  of  consciousness  is  to 
be  studied  and  solved.*' 


Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-five 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-SEVEN 
Leaving  New  York;  Seattle;  Alaska 

ON  June  10th,  1907,  Miss  Fielde  left  New 
York  City  not  to  return.  Ostensibly  she 
took  this  action  for  the  purpose  of  seeking 
a  more  congenial  climate  because  of  a  slight  bron- 
chial disorder.  But  perhaps  the  spirit  of  wander- 
lust had  as  much  to  do  with  her  leave-taking  as  any 
other  cause.  During  the  whole  of  her  life  the  vis- 
ion of  newer  and  greater  fields  to  conquer,  newer 
and  greater  spheres  of  human  usefulness,  newer 
and  greater  opportunities  for  doing  good,  was  con- 
stantly before  her. 

The  opinion  obtains  among  Miss  Fieide's  New 
York  friends,  that  her  action  in  leaving  the  only 
home  she  had  known  in  fifteen  years,  where  she 
was  comfortably  situated  financially,  surrounded 
by  hosts  of  admiring  friends  and  acquaintances,  at 
the  age  of  seventy  years,  to  go  among  strangers 
and  found  new  interests  and  form  new  friendships, 
was  the  result  of  a  sudden  impulse.  But  such  is 
not  the  case.  From  her  own  statement  she  took 
the  step  deliberately,  after  months  of  serious  reflec- 
tion. True,  she  did  not  at  once  resign  from  the 
scientific  institutions  where  she  was  regularly  em- 
ployed or  cancel  her  lecture  engagements  for  the 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-six 


Leaving  New  York;  Seattle;  Alaska 

forthcoming  season;  but  did  ask  and  receive  a 
year's  vacation.  It  is  not  improbable  that  she  took 
this  course  to  avoid  the  emotional  stress  that  would 
have  accompanied  announcements  of  final  parting. 
In  one  of  her  diary  entries,  made  at  Colorado 
Springs,  she  writes:  "I  am  now  gone  from  New 
York  and  have  burned  my  bridges  behind  me."  This 
perhaps  refers  to  the  fact  that  a  week  previously 
she  had  given  away  all  of  the  household  effects  and 
ornaments  that  had  accumulated  during  her  resi- 
dence in  New  York,  books,  natural  history  speci- 
mens, potted  plants,  pictures  and  paintings.  The 
latter  included  her  truly  valuable  collection  of  twen- 
ty-seven water  colors  from  the  studio  of  Go  Leng, 
of  Swatow,  China,  which  were  used  to  illustrate 
her  several  books  on  Chinese  life  and  which  she 
placed  in  the  Metropolitan  Museum  of  New  York. 
But  the  fact  that  she  gave  away  these  articles  of 
personal  property  is  by  no  means  conclusive  proof 
that  she  had  "burned  her  bridges.**  One  of  the  car- 
dinal principles  of  her  domestic  econom}'  was  to 
retain  possession  of  nothing  of  which  she  had  no 
immediate  use.  She  made  it  a  practice  to  give 
away  books  of  current  literature  as  soon  as  read; 
letters  she  destroyed  on  being  answered:  ordinary 
pictures  she  did  not  care  for  and  great  paintings  she 
regarded  as  a  poor  investment  because  of  the  care 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

they  entailed;  bric-a-brac  and  heirlooms  she  could 
not  tolerate.  This  latter  feeling  is  expressed  in  her 
lecture  on  the  *  'Simple  Life,*'  published  in  the  Seat- 
tle Post-Intelligencer,  September  28th,  1907,  from 
•which  the  following  is  an  excerpt: 

"The  house  should  be  scrutinized  twice  a  year, 
and  everything  that  is  unlikely  to  be  of  service  with- 
in the  next  four  seasons  should  be  eradicated.  It  is 
not  well  to  carry  a  burden  of  inanimate  objects  on 
the  soul.  Last  year  I  visited  two  New  England 
spinsters,  each  of  whom  was  the  only  survivor  of 
her  colonial  ancestors.  Each  had  a  house  crowded 
with  the  relics  of  past  generations,  hand-spun  and 
home-woven  fabrics  in  wool  and  linen,  dishes  that 
came  across  the  ocean  with  early  settlers,  imple- 
ments for  which  present  days  have  no  uses,  cloth- 
ing whose  wearers  knew  George  Washington,  and 
souvenirs  brought  by  ancient  mariners  from  distant 
lands.  Each  woman,  gray-haired  and  solitary,  had 
spent  her  years  chiefly  in  keeping  moth  and  rust 
from  these  dead  things.  She  might,  by  a  judicious 
distribution  of  them,  have  enriched  the  industrial 
departments  of  a  half  dozen  great  museums,  where 
they  would  have  been  safe  from  fire,  would  have 
been  of  educational  use  to  thousands  of  persons, 
and  would  have  set  her  mind  free  for  the  following 
of  more  cheerful  occupations.  In  order  to  live  the 
joyous,  simple  life,  one  needs  often  to  struggle  suc- 
cessfully against  one's  inheritance,  to  dispossess 
oneself  of  all  that  forebears  have  amassed,  even  of 
their  convictions." 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-eight 


Leaving  New  York;  Seattle;  Alaska 

Quoting  from  Miss  Fielde's  diary  of  1907,  she 
states : 

"I  left  New  York  at  six  p.  m.  on  the  tenth  of  June. 
My  dear  friends,  Mrs.  W.  A.  Cauldwell  and  Dr. 
Charles  M.  Cauldwell,  were  the  last  acquaintances 
I  saw.  I  spent  two  weeks  in  Colorado  Springs; 
visited  Cripple  Creek,  Pike's  Peak,  Garden  of  the 
Gods  and  Manitou;  spent  six  days  at  Yellowstone 
Park,  after  which  I  left  for  Tacoma,  Washington. 
There  I  met  Dr.  Foster,  my  old  colleague  in  Swa- 
tow,  who  took  me  to  Burton,  Vashon  Island.  The 
landscape  has  a  solemn  aspect  under  the  sky  and 
the  temperature  suits  me  well.  In  the  woods  are 
the  hemlock  trees,  such  as  I  loved  in  my  childhood. 
All  above  the  grand,  dark  green  firs,  tall  and  often 
bare  against  the  sky ;  it  is  sad  to  see  them  cut  down ; 
many  of  them  more  than  four  feet  in  diameter ;  then 
the  alders  and  the  bracken,  the  latter  more  than  four 
feet  high.  There  are  wooden  houses  and  shacks  in 
clearings;  much  burning  of  fallen  and  standing 
timber  and  a  dreadful  waste  of  wood.  The  folks 
are  not  assorted;  the  educated  and  the  untutored 
mixed  in  every  circle;  a  curious  hodge-plodge,  as 
many  states  represented  as  there  are  persons.  One 
accurate  in  speech,  his  next  hand  neighbor  ungram- 
matical  in  every  sentence.  This  is  not  the  'Simple 
Life';  it  is  the  crude;  but  the  impressive  feature  is 
the  mixedness  of  it  all." 

September  3rd,  1907,  Miss  Fielde  took  up  her 
permanent  residence  in  Seattle.  She  had  lived 

Page  Two  Hundred  Ninety-nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

quietly  and  comfortably  during  the  summer  months 
in  the  Vashon  Island  College;  but  as  winter  ap- 
proached she  strongly  felt  the  call  for  greater  activ- 
ity and  greater  participation  in  the  life  of  human 
things.  Her  first  home  in  the  northwest  metrop- 
olis was  at  the  Fairfield  Hotel.  Here  she  was  close 
to  the  social  center  of  the  city  and  near  the  Seattle 
public  library;  people  and  books  were  as  necessary 
to  her  existence  as  food  and  shelter. 

She  loved  Seattle  from  the  start.  Here  she 
found  a  great  city  in  the  making.  At  the  time  of 
her  arrival,  its  heterogeneous  mass  of  people  were 
divided  into  groups,  largely  on  lines  of  moral  de- 
markation.  Each  group  was  striving  to  build  up  a 
city  according  to  its  own  business  ideas  and  ideals, 
leavened,  of  course,  by  the  equation  of  self-interest. 
The  emotions  of  the  city  were  primitive,  not  decad- 
ent. Hundreds  of  Christian  churches  dotted  its 
hills  where  overflowing  congregations  sang  paeans 
of  love  and  worship,  while  savage  men  and  soulless 
women  brawled  and  shrilled  in  saloon,  gambling 
house  and  brothel.  She  came  to  understand  the  real 
spirit  of  Seattle  at  once,  and  within  a  few  months 
was  a  leading  influence  in  guiding  its  hesitating 
feet  into  paths  of  righteousness  and  earnestness. 
This  position  she  held  until  her  death,  eight  years 
later. 

Page  Three  Hundred 


SNAP-SHOT    OF    MISS    FIELDE    TAKEN    BY    DR.    CORA    SMITH 

KING,    NEAR   FORT   LAWTON,    OCT.,    1907,    SOON  AFTER 

MISS    FIELDE'S   ARRIVAL   AT    SEATTLE 


Leaving  New  York;  Seattle;  Alaska 

In  many  respects  Alaska  is  a  part  of  Seattle, 
though  geographically  separated  by  more  than  a 
thousand  miles  of  ocean  travel.  A  large  percent- 
age of  the  population  of  Alaska  spend  the  summer 
only  in  the  "North,"  mining,  hunting  and  fishing, 
and  return  to  their  families  in  Seattle  during  the 
winter  season.  The  permanent  residents  of  Alaska 
are  strongly  bound  to  Seattle  by  the  ties  of  busi- 
ness relations,  Seattle  being  the  entrepot  and  source 
of  trade  supplies  for  the  whole  of  that  vast  terri- 
tory. There  is  some  measure  of  truth  in  the  saying 
that  in  order  to  be  a  full-fledged  citizen  of  Seattle, 
a  person  must  have  lived  or  travelled  in  Alaska. 
Within  a  year  after  she  came  to  Seattle,  Miss  Fielde 
toured  Alaska.  Her  own  account  of  her  experi- 
ences, observations  and  opinions  is  epitomized  in 
the  following  excerpts  from  a  letter  she  wrote  to  a 
friend  in  Philadelphia: 

"As  you  have  visited  Southeastern  Alaska,  1 
will  not  bore  you  by  expatiating  upon  the  grandeur 
of  the  snow-crowned  mountains,  beauty  of  the  crys- 
tal bergs  and  glaciers,  and  the  soul-inspiring  throb 
of  its  restless  waters.  And,  perhaps,  you,  too,  dis- 
covered the  fact  that  these  mighty  works  of  crea- 
tion seem  to  have  an  overpowering  effect  upon  sen- 
sitive souls.  At  least  nine-tenths  of  the  one  hun- 
dred and  sixty-five  tourists  who  were  on  the  excur- 
sion steamer  with  me,  played  bridge  during  most 
of  the  waking  hours  while  passing  through  that 

Page  Three  Hundred  One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

glorious  scenery.  Perhaps  they  were  overcome  by 
the  beauty  of  it  and  were  driven  to  the  frivolous 
for  refuge. 

"But  nobody  knows  the  heart  of  Alaska  before 
being  on  the  Yukon.  I  spent  a  week  at  Sitka,  and 
had  a  week  of  pioneer  life  at  the  Hot  Springs  on 
Baranof  Island.  I  do  not  think  I  should  have  sur- 
vived a  second  week  there.  An  Indian  war-canoe 
took  me  back  to  Sitka,  and  then  I  went  again  to 
Skagway,  and  over  the  White  Pass,  with  frequent 
glimpses  of  the  old  trail  where  so  many  perished 
in  1 896-7-8.  At  White  Horse  I  began  the  journey 
down  the  Yukon  River;  a  journey  that  I  shall  ad- 
vise no  one  else  to  take.  From  Dawson  to  Seattle, 
via  Nome,  I  could  not  obtain  a  tumblerful  of  clean 
water  to  drink,  and  the  few  tub-baths  I  could  get 
only  added  a  layer  of  Yukon  mud  to  my  surface. 
Then  the  mosses  of  the  tundras  are  breeding 
grounds  for  swarms  of  mosquitoes  and  gnats.  So 
fierce  are  these  that  prospectors  for  gold  prefer  to 
endure  a  temperature  sixty  degrees  below  zero 
rather  than  meet  them,  and  they  prospect  in  winter 
cold  instead  of  among  summer  insects.  The  food 
is  mostly  tinned  stuff,  carried  in  from  Seattle  and 
nothing  short  of  a  mining  appetite  can  long  toler- 
ate it.  During  the  summer  season  it  is  light  all  the 
time  and  the  diligent  sightseer  is  alert  at  all  hours  of 
the  night  as  well  as  of  the  day,  because  the  steamers 
stop  at  most  any  time  and  place  to  unload  freight 
and  permit  the  passengers  to  go  ashore.  It  is  not 
a  health  trip.  Nevertheless,  having  returned  alive 

Page  Three  Hundred  Two 


Leaving  New  York;  Seattle;  Alaska 

and  well,  I  am  glad  I  went.  It  was  fun  to  be  carried 
ashore  at  Nome  in  the  arms  of  a  giant.  And  when 
I  again  took  ship,  I  went  on  a  lighter,  climbed  a  stair 
of  four  bags  of  coal,  stretched  my  arms  as  high  as 
possible  and  was  hauled  into  the  coal-hole  of  the 
steamer  by  sailors  when  the  waves  lifted  me  within 
their  reach.  On  the  way  through  Behring  Sea  from 
Nome  to  Seattle,  there  were  three  hundred  and 
thirty  passengers,  of  as  heterogeneous  a  sort  as 
could  be  brought  together  from  among  English 
speaking  nations.  There  were  murderers  and  mis- 
sionaries, Eastern  society  dames  and  dance-hall 
girls,  fiends  and  saints — never  before  have  I  seen 
so  strange  a  gathering.  But  the  thrilling  hours 
have  been  those  in  which  I  had  long  talks  with  those 
who  had  spent  many  years  in  the  solitudes  near  the 
Arctic  Circle — heroes  who  have  failed  and  heroes 
who  have  succeeded  in  the  quest  for  'pay-streak.' 

"Probably  the  Eastern  newspapers  have  not  men- 
tioned the  recent  death  of  Alexander  Macdonald, 
'King  of  the  Klondike/  When  I  was  in  Alaska  I 
heard  him  spoken  of  frequently — his  history  there 
being  one  of  the  many  strange  narratives  repeated 
in  that  land  of  true  stories  that  surpass  fiction  in 
strangeness.  He  was  a  Nova  Scotian  of  Scotch 
descent,  who  mined  rather  unsuccessfully  in  Colo- 
rado for  a  decade  or  more;  went  to  Juneau  and 
worked  in  the  Treadwell  gold  mines  till  the  great 
discovery  in  1896  in  Yukon  Territory,  and  then 
was  one  of  the  earliest  to  make  his  way  over  the 
terrible  White  Pass  and  into  the  Klondike  region. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

At  the  then  new  town  of  Dawson,  where  he  arrived 
with  only  three  dollars,  he  bought  town  lots,  and 
on  Bonanza  Creek  secured  mining  claims.  In  about 
three  years  he  possessed  five  million  dollars.  He 
had  as  a  partner  a  young  Englishman;  named 
Chisholm,  and  when  he  had  to  visit  London  for 
business  reasons,  Chisholm  very  naturally  gave  him 
letters  to  his  mother.  Mrs.  Chisholm,  a  widow, 
doubtless  considered  the  uneducated  Alaska  min- 
er, sixty  years  of  age,  a  suitable  husband  for  her  own 
town-bred,  accomplished,  eighteen-year-old  daugh- 
ter. She  welcomed  Macdonald  in  her  London 
home,  and,  the  wedding  quickly  followed.  Mrs. 
Macdonald,  the  youthful  bride,  came  with  her  hus- 
band to  Alaska  but  her  stay  there  was  brief,  and  her 
time  since  has  been  spent  mostly  in  London  and 
Paris,  while  his  fortune,  under  his  personal  care  in 
Alaska- Yukon  has  swayed  from  thirty  millions  to 
nothing  at  all.  Lately  he  lived  alone  in  a  cabin  in 
one  of  the  dreariest  regions  along  the  Yukon,  a  min- 
ing district  on  the  Stewart  River;  and  the  other 
day  he  died  suddenly  of  heart-failure  while  split- 
ting wood  for  his  solitary  fire.  His  wife,  with  their 
five-year-old  son,  was  in  Vancouver,  B.  C.  So 
passes  away  one  of  the  great  figures  from  that  mar- 
velous stage — the  Northwest. 

"Even  the  trying  tour  of  the  Yukon  has  not  taken 
Alaska  wholly  out  of  my  system.  No  qualifying 
words  can  express  or  describe  its  stillness,  its  cold, 
its  beauty,  its  terrors,  the  heroism  of  its  heroes,  the 
badness  of  its  villains,  the  marvel  of  the  human 
lives  that  are  lived  there." 

Page  Three  Hundred  Four 


Leaving  New  York;  Seattle;  Alaska 

Because  of  her  exalted  reputation  and  interest- 
ing personality,  Miss  Fielde  found  herself  a  wel- 
come associate  of  many  cultured  people  of  Seattle 
within  a  very  short  time  of  her  arrival  in  that  city. 
Soon  after  her  return  from  Alaska  she  became  the 
central  figure  in  the  organization  of  what  she  term- 
ed her  "Rainy  Day  Club,"  which  was  composed 
exclusively  of  women  distinguished  for  social  lead- 
ership. Ostensibly  the  purpose  of  the  club  was  to 
meet  fortnightly  and  discuss  books  of  merit  and 
topics  of  current  literature  during  the  months  of 
the  rainy  season  of  the  year.  But,  according  to 
some  of  Miss  Fielde's  written  accounts  of  these 
meetings,  nearly  every  realm  of  modern  thought 
was  sometimes  invaded.  The  by-laws  limited  the 
membership  to  a  dozen.  In  1 908  Mrs.  William  H. 
McEwan,  Mrs.  Geo.  H.  Walker,  Mrs.  Manson  F. 
Backus,  Mrs.  John  H.  Powell,  Mrs.  Robert  H. 
Boyle,  Mrs.  William  H.  Jewett,  Mrs.  W.  D.  Per- 
kins, Mrs.  L.  B.  Stedman,  Mrs.  J.  D.  Lowman,  Mrs. 
A.  B.  Stewart,  Mrs.  William  Biglow  and  Miss  Fielde 
made  up  its  personnel;  and  during  the  eight  years 
of  Miss  Fielde's  membership,  no  changes  were 
made. 


Page  Three  Hundred  Five 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-EIGHT 

Civic  Activities;  Sanitation;  Public  Health;  Direct 
Legislation 

WITHIN    a    few    months    after    Miss    Fielde 
established  her  residence  in  Seattle,  she  had 
gained   a  complete   understanding   of   the 
city  and  became  a  participant  in  all  of  its  public 
activities.     Research  work  in  municipal  affairs  was 
an  occupation  with  which  she  was  especially  fam- 
iliar and  in  which  she  was  especially  proficient. 

She  found  Seattle  a  "big  straggling  village  with 
a  great  city  in  the  making,"  as  she  herself  describ- 
ed it  to  one  of  her  correspondents.  She  also  found 
that  it  possessed  the  same  municipal  problems,  the 
same  civic  interests  and  the  same  political  issues, 
that  are  manifest  in  every  Western  community  of 
any  considerable  size.  The  same  conditions  here 
prevailed  as  elsewhere.  A  disorganized  body  of 
good  citizens  were  struggling  to  defend  the  general 
welfare  of  the  city  against  the  predations  of  a  well 
organized  band  of  special-privilege  seekers ;  the  af- 
fairs of  the  city  were  ring-ruled  and  official  corrup- 
tion was  present  in  nearly  every  department  of  the 
municipality.  All  forms  of  vice  were  practiced 
without  police  restriction  or  attempted  regulation 

Page  Three  Hundred  Six 


Civic  Activities 

and  very  little  attention  was  paid  to  even  the  most 
common  measures  of  sanitation. 

The  following  letter,  written  to  a  friend  in  New 
York,  contains  suggestions  of  the  many  civic  needs 
of  Seattle  at  the  time  of  Miss  Fielde's  arrival  and 
an  outline  of  her  labors  and  achievements  during 
the  first  three  years  of  her  residence  in  the  metro- 
polis of  the  Pacific  Northwest : 

"My  Dear  Friend: 

"You  have  brought  upon  yourself  these  foolscap 
pages,  by  asking  me  to  tell  you  what  I  have  done 
since  I  came  to  Seattle,  Sept.  3rd,  1 907. 

"Anyone  having  intelligence,  experience,  leisure, 
and  a  small  surplus  beyond  necessary  current  ex- 
penses, can  do  much  service  in  a  city  that  is  still 
in  its  formative  period.  Natural  and  acquired  abil- 
ity are  sooner  applied  in  a  new  country,  because  of 
its  inchoate  conditions.  Leisure  is  more  rarely  pos- 
sessed by  either  man  or  woman.  The  small  sur- 
plus is  an  absolute  necessity  for  the  exercise  of  the 
other  three  pieces  of  property  in  altruistic  endea- 
vor; because  the  struggle  of  life  on  the  frontier 
makes  the  strugglers  grasp  their  dollars  very  tight- 
ly; and  nobody  knows  who  else  is  trustworthy  or 
wise.  Being  unknown  here,  that  is,  just  as  un- 
known as  is  everybody  else,  I  have  not  been  called 
upon  to  do  that  which  I  can  do  best;  but  I  have 
watched  events  and  observed  conditions  and  tried 
to  give  a  better  trend  to  what  is  happening  here. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Acting  on  my  principle  of  living  where  I  am,  I  have 
studied  Seattle,  and  become  a  part  of  it.  That  is  all 
I  have  done. 

"When  I  first  arrived,  the  health  conditions  were 
naturally  my  first  concern.  I  got  the  very  imper- 
fectly recorded  vital  statistics  from  the  Health 
Board;  compiled  tables  and  secured  facts  relating 
to  the  preceding  three  years;  and  took  them  to  the 
Mayor  for  his  consideration,  asking  him  if  he  would 
support  an  ordinance  of  the  City  Council,  creating 
an  isolation  hospital,  for  the  care  of  sufferers  from 
contagious  diseases.  With  a  letter  of  introduction 
from  him,  1  visited  many  members  (18)  of  the 
City  Council,  presented  the  same  facts  to  them  as 
individuals,  and  then  urged  the  plan  at  a  meeting 
of  the  Council.  I  wrote  articles  for  the  newspapers 
in  favor  of  such  a  hospital,  and  then  other  persons 
wrote  also.  On  December  15,  1907,  the  matter 
came  before  the  Council  and  the  Health  Board.  Dr. 
Crichton,  chairman  of  the  Sanitation  Committee  in 
the  Council,  with  whom  I  had  discussed  reasons 
and  plans,  introduced  the  ordinance  in  the  Council. 
Later  on,  a  fine  site  (but  too  small)  was  bought  for 
$6500,  and  last  March,  1910,  the  voters  of  Seattle 
voted  in  favor  of  issuing  city  bonds,  to  the  amount 
of  $25,000  for  the  building  of  the  isolation  hospi- 
tal. The  matter  is  now  in  the  hands  of  Dr.  J.  E. 
Crichton,  who  is  now  Health  Commissioner,  and 
who  has  from  the  beginning  favored  the  isolation 
hospital  idea.  All  this  history  will  lead  you  to  ex- 
cuse him  for  putting  in  the  May,  1910,  Health 

Page  Three  Hundred  Eight 


Civic  Activities 

Bulletin  of  Seattle  a  statement  so  egregious  as  you 
see  in  the  subjoined  print:  'Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde 
has  probably  given  the  subject  of  sanitation  and 
hospital  construction  as  much  attention  as  any  oth- 
er woman  in  the  United  States.  Since  she  became  a 
resident  of  Seattle  she  has  taken  a  great  deal  of  in- 
terest in  such  work,  and  her  advice  has  often  been 
sought  by  this  department/ 

"This  isolation  hospital  scheme  is  now  wholly 
off  my  mind.  Dr.  Crichton  is  able  and  active,  and 
the  said  hospital  will  be  duly  achieved. 

"October  31,  1907,  the  leading  newspaper  here 
contained  a  lengthy  article  of  mine,  which  it  en- 
titled "A  Woman  Scientist  on  Flea  Extermination" ; 
followed  on  November  24th,  1907,  by  a  lengthier 
one  entitled  "Urges  Fight  on  the  Ubiquitous  Flea." 
The  bubonic  plague  had  appeared  here  in  that 
month,  (October,  1907)  and  five  persons  died  of 
it.  So  indifferent  was  the  public  that  it  was  dif- 
ficult to  get  sane  attention  to  the  danger  from  rats 
and  their  fleas.  The  Health  Board,  however,  made 
warfare  on  rats,  and  so  continuous  has  it  been,  that 
no  later  case  has  developed.  Diseased  rats  are  oc- 
casionally discovered  and  Seattle  has  escaped  the 
spread  of  plague  that  has  occurred  in  California  be- 
cause of  a  concealment  of,  or  failure  to  publish,  its 
first  appearance  there. 

"In  January,  1908,  there  were  extraordinary 
troubles  for  the  unemployed,  and  uncommon  num- 
bers of  such  congregated  in  Seattle.  I  was  on  the 
advisory  committee  of  the  Organized  Charities,  and 

Page  Three  Hundred  Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

so  heard  much  concerning  the  stress  of  the  time  of 
panic.  On  January  19th,  1908,  a  Seattle  news- 
paper contained  my  plea  of  State  employment  for 
the  unemployed,  which  it  headed  'A  Woman's 
Plan  for  the  Unemployed.'  This  article  I  afterward 
enlarged  and  repeated,  so  that  some  form  of  it  ap- 
peared in  several  papers:  and  in  October,  1908,  it 
formed  the  gist  of  my  paper,  read  by  me  at  the 
'State  Conference  of  Charities,'  on  A  Scheme  for 
Labor  Colonies  Under  a  State  Board  of  Charities 
and  Corrections.  Besides  the  copies  printed  in  the 
newspapers,  1  had  1 0,000  copies  printed  at  my  own 
expense,  and  these  were  distributed  by  club  women, 
and  charity  societies,  throughout  the  State  and 
they  have  also  been  distributed  from  Oregon's  char- 
ity organization.  The  plan  has  been  highly  com- 
mended by  those  conversant  with  the  troubles  that 
the  unemployed  bring  to  the  charity  organizations; 
but  there  is,  and  always  will  be,  secret  and  power- 
ful opposition  to  the  plan,  from  employers  of  la- 
bor, who  wish  to  have  the  demand  for  work  far  ex- 
ceed the  supply. 

"In  December,  1908,  I  was  on  the  'tuberculosis 
committee'  of  the  'charity  organization'  and  intro- 
duced in  its  meeting  the  motion  to  form  a  county 
branch  of  the  State  'Society  for  the  Prevention  and 
Relief  of  Tuberculosis.'  I  have  never  been  absent 
from  any  meeting  of  this  committee,  nor  of  the 
'Anti-Tuberculosis  League  of  King  County*  into 
which  it  developed.  I  made  its  first  Constitution 
and  By-Laws;  was  its  first  life-member,  (when  it 

Page  Three  Hundred  Ten 


Civic  Activities 

had  not  money  enough  even  for  necessary  station- 
ery ! )  and  did  whatever  I  could  to  establish  it.  Last 
March,  the  voters  of  Seattle  voted  a  $10,000  bond 
issue  by  the  city  to  build  its  sanitorium.  However, 
the  death  of  the  son  of  Mr.  H.  C.  Henry,  last  spring, 
placed  Mr.  Henry  in  a  frame  of  mind  in  which  he 
was  willing  to  become  the  president  of  the  Anti- 
Tuberculosis  League.  He  and  his  tens  of  thous- 
ands of  dollars  found  such  a  foundation  laid  for  the 
anti-tuberculosis  work,  that  it  can  be  carried  on 
with  acclaim ;  and  it  will  become  one  of  the  greatest 
benefactions  ever  founded  in  Seattle.  The  $10,- 
000  voted  by  the  city  will  build  a  city  sanitorium 
for  the  tuberculous.  From  this  time  the  whole 
'anti-tuberculosis'  work  will  be  competently  carried 
on.  I  shall  give  it  no  time  or  thought  hereafter. 

*'In  March,  1 908,  I  suggested  to  a  few  women  of 
artistic  pursuits,  at  a  meeting  for  another  purpose 
in  Mrs.  H.  H.  Field's  home,  that  a  Seattle  Fine  Arts 
Association  be  organized,  with  nine  departments, 
covering  painting,  plastic,  ceramic,  decorative  art, 
applied  design,  art  in  attire,  architecture,  landscape 
gardening.  A  committee  for  organization  was  ap- 
pointed. I  prepared  the  By-Laws ;  Dr.  F.  M.  Padel- 
f ord  was  elected  president ;  and  since  then  the  asso- 
ciation has  prospered  with  monthly  meetings 
through  the  winter.  I  have  given  three  lectures  at 
the  monthly  meetings. 

"Soon  after  I  arrived  here,  I  was  asked  by  the 
(New  Haven)  secretary  of  the  Committee  of  One 
Hundred  to  be  one  in  the  Author's  League,  work- 
Page  Three  Hundred  Eleven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ing  for  the  establishment  of  a  National  Department 
of  Health.  I  assented,  and  have  ever  since  done  a 
considerable  bit  of  writing  for  that  purpose.  I  am 
all  the  time  writing,  or  distributing  printed  matter, 
in  furtherance  of  the  National  Health  Department 
idea.  Lately  I  sent  thirty-five  letters  to  Senators 
and  Representatives  urging  their  favorable  action 
upon  the  Owen  Bill.  I  have  just  been  making  ex- 
tracts (for  three  days)  from  Mr.  Owen's  speech  in 
the  U.  S.  Senate,  and  have  edited  the  extracts,  so 
that  they  will  appeal  to  the  editors  of  the  three 
newspapers  to  which  I  am  sending  them  for  re- 
print. This  is  a  work  of  education  of  the  people, 
and  the  formation  of  a  public  opinion  that  will  move 
the  federal  legislators  to  right  action ;  and  this  work 
will  probably  need  to  be  continued  for  some  years. 

"At  odd  times  I  have  talked  in  the  'Story  Tellers' 
Association,'  and  have  told  them  some  Chinese 
stories  to  use  in  the  schools  here.  And  I  have  lec- 
tured several  times  in  Women's  Clubs  on  subjects 
so  familiar  to  me  that  no  research  was  needed  in 
preparation. 

"I  think  my  largest  undertaking  has  been  that  for 
the  furtherance  of  direct  legislation  in  this  state. 
Last  August  I  attended  a  meeting  in  the  Exposition 
grounds,  where  Mr.  U'Ren,  'father  of  direct  legis- 
lation in  Oregon,'  gave  an  address.  There  was  a 
Direct  Legislation  League  in  this  state,  of  few  mem- 
bers, but  it  was  doing  no  work  visible  to  my  eyes 
or  discoverable  to  my  inquiries.  I  thought  I  would 
work  by  myself  awhile.  So  I  wrote  the  pamphlet 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twelve 


Civic  Activities 

you  have  received,  eight  pages  long,  addressed  to 
voters.  It  was  first  printed  on  November  13,1 909, 
and  the  whole  of  it,  or  portions  of  it,  appeared  in 
several  State  of  Washington  newspapers.  I  had 
25,000  copies  printed  at  my  own  expense,  and  the 
labor  unions  distributed  by  hand  many  thousands 
throughout  the  state,  while  more  thousands  were 
distributed  from  the  Public  Library,  at  the  City 
Hall,  and  by  Single  Taxers.  All  have  gone  out 
and  are  influential.  Then  a  committee  (all  of  men) 
met  at  my  home.  By-Laws  that  I  had  prepared 
were  adopted.  In  April,  1910,  the  Direct  Legisla- 
tion League  was  organized,  officers  chosen,  and 
work  effectively  begun.  Thirty-five  thousand  cop- 
ies of  Senator  Bourne's  speech  in  the  U.  S.  Senate 
will  be  distributed  by  the  state  within  a  month. 
There  are  about  200,000  voters  in  the  state.  All 
the  grangers,  all  the  labor  unions,  all  the  Single 
Taxers,  all  the  Socialists,  are  in  favor  of  direct  leg- 
islation, as  soon  as  they  understand  what  it  is.  Mr. 
Christopher  Horr,  the  secretary,  and  I  work  pretty 
constantly,  and  without  hope  of  other  reward  than 
the  attainment  of  the  object.  The  great  end  in 
view  is  to  bring  the  power  of  self-government  into 
the  hands  of  the  people.  The  opposers  to  this  ef- 
fort are  all  those  who  profit  by  methods  of  legisla- 
tion that  they  can  'influence*  by  personal  means. 
The  'special  interests'  are  all  on  the  side  of  indirect 
legislation.  We  shall  win,  in  time. 

"The  first  month  that  I  spent  here  I  joined  the 
suffragists,  and  I  have  spent  considerable  time  on 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

their  affairs.  I  have  made  the  Constitution  for  three 
suffrage  organizations,  and  have  written  some  ar- 
ticles for  the  cause.  'A  score  of  Reasons  Why 
Women  Should  Be  Enfranchised*  was  printed  in  a 
large  number  of  newspapers  of  this  state;  and 
15,000  separate  copies,  printed  at  the  expense  of 
the  Seattle  Suffrage  Club,  have  been  distributed  by 
hand  in  Seattle  and  Tacoma. 

"The  'small  surplus*  enables  me  to  keep  up  my 
membership  in  some  twenty  organizations,  where, 
as  a  member,  I  can  introduce  motions  and  debate, 
and  generally  get  my  way  in  what  I  want  to  do.  I 
have  done  a  good  bit  of  talking;  and  on  looking 
over  my  scrap-book,  I  find  that  I  have  written 
enough  since  I  came  here  to  fill  about  1 00  quarto 
pages,  in  print.  This  means  that  my  ideas  have 
been  set  up  and  sent  forth  in  black  and  white — un- 
counted times. 

"So  there  is  my  reckoning  for  almost  three  years. 
How  small  it  is  in  comparison  with  what  many 
other  women  have  done  in  that  same  time!  Prob- 
ably many  women  have  given  birth  to  poets,  art- 
ists, inventors,  whose  future  outputs  will  bring  un- 
reckonable  good  to  the  world.  Many  women  have 
bestowed  money  for  the  building  of  hospitals  where 
frightful  suffering  will  be  abated.  Many  women 
have  written  books  that  will  delight  tens  of  thous- 
ands of  readers  through  decades  to  come.  Many 
have  been  'angels,  unawares,'  and  who  knows  how 
far  or  how  deep  into  the  universe  the  influence  of 
any  angel  extends? 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fourteen 


Civic  Activities 

"Really,  I  who  live  so  peacefully  and  at  ease,  am 
much  ashamed  that  I  should  have  written  nine  fools- 
cap pages  about  my  little  doings  since  I  came  here. 
But  1  like  to  do  what  you  ask  from  me,  so  I  send  the 
pages  on  to  you. 

"Ever  most  affectionately  yours, 

"Adele  M.  Fielde." 


Page  Three  Hundred  Fifteen 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-NINE 
The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 

IN  the  fall  of   1910  the  Constitutional  Amend- 
ment   providing    for    the    enfranchisement   of 
women  was  submitted  to  the  electorate  of  the 
State  of  Washington.    The  measure  received  a  ma- 
jority vote  of  over  40,000  and  was  proclaimed  a 
law  very  soon  thereafter. 

Miss  Fielde  worked  very  hard  for  its  success  dur- 
ing a  year  or  so  prior  to  the  election.  She  had 
spoken  in  many  cities  and  towns  of  the  state  and 
her  contributed  writings  on  the  subject  of  suf- 
frage were  voluminous  and  well  circulated.  Over 
1 00,000  copies  of  her  newspaper  article,  "A  Score 
of  Reasons  for  Equal  Suffrage,"  alone,  were  re- 
produced in  pamphlet  form  and  distributed  among 
the  voters.  She  was  highly  gratified  with  the  re- 
sults of  her  efforts.  Her  first  experience  as  a  prac- 
tical politician  is  entertainingly  described  in  a  let- 
ter to  Dr.  Anna  Howard  Shaw,  written  a  few  days 
after  the  momentous  election,  when  sufficient  re- 
turns had  been  received  to  justify  assurances  of 
victory.  In  this  she  said: 

"Last  Tuesday,  with  many  other  women-suf- 
fragists, I  stood  for  hours  in  the  rain  to  ask  the  men 
who  approached  the  polling  places  whether  they 

Page  Three  Hundred  Sixteen 


The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 

would  vote  in  favor  of  *  Amendment  to  Article  Six,* 
for  the  enfranchisement  of  the  women  of  this  state. 

"It  was  an  interesting  experience.  A  labor  union 
man,  who  stood  near  me,  canvassing  for  his  party, 
told  me  much  about  the  men  who  came  to  vote. 
My  station  was  on  a  muddy  street,  where  shops  and 
dwellings  were  commingled.  For  their  favorable 
vote,  I  asked  colored  men,  some  of  whom  might 
have  been  slaves  or  the  offspring  of  those  who  were 
slaves  previous  to  the  Civil  War.  A  majority  of 
these  refused  to  vote  for  the  amendment.  I  lived 
through  that  war,  and  worked  as  hard  as  I  well 
could  for  the  freeing  of  the  black  people,  but  I  have 
never  voted.  I  asked  foreign-born  men,  whose 
speech  betrayed  the  somewhat  recent  immigration 
of  their  folk.  My  forebears  came  to  this  country 
and  pioneered  in  its  wilderness  many  generations 
ago.  They  earned  for  their  descendants  the  right 
to  the  franchise.  I  have  never  been  permitted  to 
cast  the  ballot.  I  asked  gamblers  and  thieves  and 
grafters;  some  of  them  said  no.  I  do  not  think  I 
have  ever  taken  from  anyone  a  single  penny  that 
was  not  honestly  mine.  But  these  men  had  the 
power  to  settle  the  question  of  my  enfranchise- 
ment. I  asked  politicians,  who  came  in  motor  cars 
bearing  partisan  banners,  and  they  said  they  would 
try  to  secure  votes  for  the  Amendment  of  Article 
Six  if  I  would  work  for  their  candidates.  I  de- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventeen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 


clined  to  mortgage  my  future  estate.  Every  man 
was  courteous  to  me,  even  a  tipsy  one,  who  came 
near  falling  into  the  gutter  when  he  lifted  his  hat. 
But  when  I  reached  home  and  sat  down  to  think,  I 
knew  that  the  iron  had  entered  my  soul.  I,  a  teacher 
of  government,  had  been  subjected  to  the  humilia- 
tion of  asking  the  ignorant,  the  vicious,  the  scorner, 
to  vote  for  my  enfranchisement,  an  enfranchise- 
ment that  should  be  mine  by  right  of  birth,  of  edu- 
cation, and  of  good  works.  I  decided  that  I  would 
cease  to  love  my  unjust  country  unless  I  should 
hear  the  news  I  hoped  for  within  the  next  few 
hours. 

"Presently  there  came  over  the  telephone  from 
the  newspaper  offices  the  glad  tidings:  'We  think 
the  amendment  has  carried  by  three  to  one;  the 
amendment  has  been  carried  in  Seattle  by  two  to 
one ;  probably  the  amendment  has  a  majority  some- 
thing like  sixteen  to  one/  That  was  before  the  votes 
were  really  counted.  The  votes  have  not  as  yet 
had  their  official  count  completed,  but  there  is  no 
doubt  that  there  will  be  a  majority  of  forty  thous- 
and in  the  state  in  favor  of  the  amendment.  The 
Governor  will  issue  the  necessary  proclamation  of 
the  result  sometime  before  Thanksgiving,  and  then 
the  women  may  at  once  register  as  electors.  A 
small  minority  here  are  opposed  to  their  own  en- 
franchisement. But  they  are,  of  course,  not  com- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Eighteen 


The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 

pelled  to  exercise  their  right  to  vote.  In  order  to 
disenfranchise  themselves  they  have  only  to  join 
the  ranks  of  the  disqualified  classes.  Here,  as  else- 
where, the  idiotic,  insane  and  criminal  are  not  per- 
mitted to  go  to  the  polls. 

"I  was  born  in  New  York,  and  I  have  been  en- 
franchised in  Washington.  It  is  better  to  be  en- 
franchised than  to  be  born;  because  being  enfran- 
chised is  a  certain  good,  consciously  enjoyed,  while 
being  born  is  an  unconscious  process  of  uncertain 
value.  I  shall  stay  in  the  State  of  Washington, 
where  I  am  now  in  reality  an  American  citizen.*' 

It  is  significant  that  the  first  instance  in  which 
the  women  of  Washington  exercised  their  newly- 
granted  privilege  was  in  the  work  of  moral  reform. 
To  them  chiefly  is  due  the  credit  of  recalling  Hiram 
C.  Gill,  distinguished  in  local  chronology  as  the 
"vice"  mayor  of  Seattle.  For  a  year  or  more  prior 
to  this  event,  the  civic  condition  of  the  metropolis  of 
the  Pacific  Northwest  was  truly  deplorable.  Com- 
mercialized vice  was  dominant.  The  city  was  in- 
fested with  every  known  variety  of  criminal, 
thieves,  gamblers,  confidence  men  and  prostitutes, 
who  plied  their  respective  vocations  without  police 
interference. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Nineteen 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Fortunately  the  City  Charter  of  Seattle  provided 
for  the  recall  of  delinquent  public  officials  and  this 
law  was  invoked  for  the  removal  of  Gill.  Numer- 
ous petitions  were  circulated,  and  within  a  com- 
paratively short  time,  more  signatures  than 
the  law  required  were  secured.  At  a  special 
election  in  the  spring  of  1911,  Gill  was  recalled  and 
the  situation  was  relieved  for  the  time  being. 

After  equal  suffrage  had  been  gained,  Miss 
Fielde  readily  foresaw  that  the  enfranchisement  of 
women  was  little  more  than  a  promise  of  better 
things  to  come  rather  than  the  present  fulfillment 
of  that  desire.  She  appreciated  the  fact  that  there 
was  a  vast  difference  between  gaining  the  right  to 
vote  and  in  acquiring  the  knowledge  to  vote  right. 
A  new  army  had  been  enlisted,  but  the  soldiers  were 
untrained  and  undisciplined.  True,  women  voters 
had  a  decided  advantage  over  men,  in  that  they 
were  untrammelled  by  partisan  prejudice  and  un- 
fettered by  partisan  affiliation;  but  it  was  equally 
true  that  the  vast  majority  of  them  were  ignorant 
of  political  measures  and  methods.  She  realized  the 
great  need  for  education  in  this  most  important  de- 
partment of  social  economy  and  she  at  once  com- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty 


The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 

mitted  herself  to  that  work  with  the  energy  and  sys- 
tematic thoroughness  which  characterized  her  every 
undertaking. 

Her  first  step  in  this  direction  was  to  organize 
the  Seattle  Civic  Forum,  of  which  she  herself  wrote 
the  Constitution  and  By-Laws.  The  object  of  the 
Civic  Forum,  according  to  Article  II  of  the  latter 
instrument,  was  to  "educate  those  women  and  men 
politically  who  exercise  the  right  of  suffrage,  and 
are  thereby  invested  with  the  power  to  promote  or 
impair  the  welfare  of  the  people  of  this  city  and 
state."  The  same  paragraph  declares  also  that: 
"The  creation  of  a  keen  sense  of  individual  respon- 
sibility for  the  common  weal  shall  be  the  primary 
aim  of  all  the  Forum's  teachings."  The  control 
and  management  of  the  organization  was  placed  in 
the  hands  of  seven  trustees  and  an  Advisory  Com- 
mittee. Miss  Fielde  was  elected  president;  Mrs. 
John  M.  Winslow,  vice-president;  Mrs.  Margaret 
Platt,  secretary;  Mrs.  I.  H.  Jennings,  treasurer; 
Mr.  William  Pitt  Trimble,  fiscal  adviser;  Mr.  Geo. 
H.  Walker,  legal  adviser,  and  Mr.  Geo.  F.  Cotterill, 
economic  adviser. 

In  a  letter  to  a  friend  in  the  east,  Miss  Fielde 
wrote : 

"I  am  quietly  engaged  in  the  persuasion  of  some 

Page   Three  Hundred  Twenty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

persons  (of  quality  known  to  me)  to  create  a  Civic 
Forum  for  Seattle.  I  who  have  no  family,  and  have 
only  an  apartment  and  a  housemaid  to  look  after, 
have  more  time  than  the  majority  of  folk  to  spend 
in  persuasion.  I  have  all  my  life  been  largely  en- 
grossed in  doing  things  that  were  in  sore  need  of 
being  done,  and  that  no  one  else  wanted  to  do.  I 
have  never  taken  labor  from  the  hands  of  anybody 
who  wanted  that  particular  piece  of  work.  Within 
a  year  I  have  been  anonymously  and  privately  edu- 
cating folk  and  the  Forum  plan  meets  with  univer- 
sal approval  and  the  outlook  is  promising.  The 
vice-president,  Mrs.  John  M.  Winslow,  is  a  charm- 
ing woman,  and  it  is  fortunate  that  her  husband  is 
one  of  our  patient  and  steadfast  coadjutors.  I  am 
not  copying  the  old  League  for  Political  Education, 
of  New  York,  but  I  am  making  use  of  the  experi- 
ence gained  therein.  I  am  determined  to  live  joy- 
fully. So  I  seek  the  new.  I  will  stay  in  Seattle  *a 
while  at  least*  and  grow  up  with  the  country." 

At  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  Civic  Forum 
there  was  a  strong  public  movement  throughout 
the  State  of  Washington  in  favor  of  direct  legisla- 
tion. The  legislative  session  of  1911  had  just 
passed  a  measure  submitting  the  Initiative,  Refer- 
endum and  Recall  to  the  vote  of  the  people  as  a 
constitutional  amendment  and  these  three  primary 
principles  of  direct  legislation  were  being  discussed 
everywhere.  Miss  Fielde  was  a  strong  proponent 
of  democracy  in  every  form,  believing  that  political 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty-Two 


The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 

advancement  consisted  largely  in  displacing  meas- 
ures of  government  by  representation  with  those 
of  government  by  direct  legislation.  She  had  de- 
voted many  years  of  her  life  to  the  study  of  the 
different  forms  of  government  of  the  European  na- 
tions as  well  as  that  of  this  country  and  was  un- 
usually well  equipped  to  give  instructions  in  that 
branch  of  science.  It  was  a  peculiarity  of  her  be- 
lief that  the  democracy  of  Switzerland  and  some  of 
the  democratic  principles  of  New  Zealand  and  Aus- 
tralia presented  certain  political  advantages  which 
the  United  States  could  adopt  with  profit.  As  a  re- 
sult much  of  the  teachings  of  the  Civic  Forum  were 
embodied  in  lectures  on  subjects  of  advancements, 
improvements  and  reforms  in  governmental  affairs, 
but  not  exclusively  so.  In  one  of  the  programs  an- 
nouncing the  exercises  of  a  single  meeting  we  find 
talks  on  "Socialism  and  Democracy  Contrasted — 
Paternalism  versus  Fraternal  ism;"  "Human  Life — 
the  Nation's  Most  Valuable  Asset;"  "The  Child 
Labor  Problem;"  "The  Eight-Hour  Law  for  Wom- 
en Wage  Earners;"  "The  Proposed  Enactment  of 
a  Workman's  Compensation  Law;"  "State  Super- 
vision of  Charities,"  etc. 

The  Civic  Forum  lasted  just  four  months,  June, 
July,  August  and  September  of  191  1,  but  in  that 
time  it  had  served  the  purpose  for  which  it  was 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

created.  Similar  organizations  had  been  formed 
simultaneously  in  many  of  the  larger  cities  and 
towns  throughout  the  State  and  public  sentiment 
was  fully  aroused  to  the  need  of  direct  legislation 
and  the  people  educated  to  a  knowledge  of  the  im- 
portant uses  to  which  it  could  be  put  if  enacted  into 
an  instrument  of  law.  The  following  year  after 
the  Civic  Forum  of  Seattle  had  been  dissolved,  a 
general  election  was  held  in  Washington  at  which 
the  proposed  Constitutional  Amendment  providing 
for  the  initiative,  referendum  and  recall  was  sub- 
mitted to  a  vote  of  the  people.  The  measure  re- 
ceived a  substantial  majority  and  bcame  one  of  the 
fundamental  laws  of  the  State. 

Several  months  before  the  Civic  Forum  disband- 
ed, Miss  Fielde  organized  the  Washington  Women's 
Legislative  Committee.  This  organization  practi- 
cally grew  out  of  the  Civic  Forum,  the  personnel  of 
the  officers  being  largely  identical,  though  its  mem- 
bership was  restricted  to  women  only.  The  pur- 
poses of  the  two  organizations,  however,  were  en- 
tirely different.  The  Civic  Forum  was  an  educa- 
tional institution,  while  the  Washington  Women's 
Legislative  Committee  was  committed  to  active  par- 
ticipation in  matters  of  legislation. 

It  was  the  belief  of  Miss  Fielde  and  her  cowork- 
ers  that  much  good  could  be  accomplished  if  the 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty-Four 


The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 

intelligent  women  voters  of  the  State  devoted  their 
energies  and  exerted  their  influence  for  the  promo- 
tion of  good  legislation.  According  to  Article  II 
of  the  Legislative  Committee,  the  object  of  the  or- 
ganization was,  first,  * 'Convenience  of  intercourse 
among  the  women  of  Washington  and  the  dissem- 
ination among  them  of  information  concerning 
legislation  that  affects  the  home,  children,  foods, 
sanitation,  or  the  general  interest  of  the  people  of 
this  State.  Second,  the  assembling  of  women  in 
large  or  small  groups  throughout  the  State  for  the 
discussion  of  conditions,  candidates  or  measures 
that  may  influence  their  domestic  or  political  wel- 
fare." 

Before  the  summer  of  1911  had  passed  branches 
of  the  Washington  Women's  Legislative  Commit- 
tee had  been  formed  in  several  cities  and  many  of 
the  larger  towns  of  the  State.  During  its  existence 
of  five  years  it  proved  a  highly  effective  means  of 
promoting  good  legislation  and  for  the  repeal  and 
amendment  of  some  that  was  bad.  One  of  the 
most  notable  achievements  to  which  it  was  a  strong- 
ly contributing  factor  was  the  creation  and  support 
of  the  public  movement  that  prompted  the  passage 
of  the  Initiative,  Referendum  and  Recall,  the  Red 
Light  Injunction  and  Abatement  Law,  Repeal  of 
the  Corroborative  Evidence  Act,  and  State-wide 
prohibition.  It  is  not  the  intention  of  the  writer 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

hereof  to  represent  the  Washington  Women's  Leg- 
islative Committee  as  the  only  responsible  agency 
for  the  foregoing  enactments,  for  such  is  not  the 
fact.  But  it  is  a  fact  that  nearly  all  the  advance 
legislation  of  that  period  was  due  to  the  efforts  of 
the  women  voters  of  the  State  as  a  whole.  Miss 
Fielde  fairly  well  described  the  cooperation  of  the 
workers  and  the  coordination  of  the  work  they  ac- 
complished in  a  magazine  article  written  in  the 
summer  of  1 9 1 4.  In  this  she  says : 

"Previous  to  the  convening  of  the  legislature  of 
1913,  different  women's  organizations,  by  mutual 
consent  and  for  the  purpose  of  efficiency,  agreed  to 
each  be  responsible  for  the  promotion  of  one  or 
more  particular  bills  to  be  presented  for  the  action 
of  the  legislative  body.  Throughout  the  session 
these  organizations  worked  earnestly,  for  their  re- 
spective measures,  and  all  worked  as  a  unit  when 
concerted  action  became  necessary.  Among  the 
measures  successfully  carried  was  the  pension  for 
indigent  mothers,  advocated  by  the  Mothers'  Con- 
gress; the  repeal  of  the  Corroborative  Evidence 
Act,  urged  by  the  Women's  Christian  Temperance 
Union ;  the  Minimum  Wage  for  Women,  under  the 
impulsion  of  the  Waitresses  Union ;  the  segregation 
of  the  sexes  in  the  Reform  School,  pushed  by  a 
committee  of  women  investigators  and  the  State 
Federation  of  Women's  Clubs;  and  the  Red  Light 
Injunction  and  Abatement  Law,  made  the  special 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty-Six 


The  Equal  Suffrage  Campaign 

interest  of  the  Washington  Women's  Legislative 
Committee.  Other  important  bills  might  be  men- 
tioned." 

Miss  Fielde  spent  the  fall  of  1911  and  spring  of 
1912  in  Tucson  and  other  localities  of  Arizona. 
She  had  passed  a  strenuous  year  in  her  work  for  the 
cause  of  equal  suffrage  and  her  self-imposed  duties 
as  a  teacher  of  government  of  the  Civic  Forum  and 
needed  rest  badly.  Besides  her  bronchial  disorder, 
the  cause  of  her  exile  from  New  York,  had  recently 
renewed  its  troublous  activities  and  was  a  constant 
drain  on  her  physical  strength. 

But  Arizona  did  not  afford  her  the  rest  and  re- 
cuperation that  she  sought.  At  that  time  the  Ter- 
ritory was  undergoing  preparations  for  admission 
to  statehood  and  Miss  Fielde  again  found  herself 
plunged  into  the  turbulence  of  another  political 
campaign.  She  reached  Tucson  about  the  middle 
of  November,  1911,  and  on  December  5th  of  the 
same  year,  we  read  from  articles  clipped  from  the 
newspapers  of  that  city  that  she  made  a  lengthy 
address  on  equal  suffrage  before  the  State  Federa- 
tion of  Women's  Clubs.  From  the  same  source  of 
authority  we  learn  that  she  made  eight  talks  on 
equal  suffrage  and  other  political  issues  before  large 
audiences  during  the  month  of  December,  twelve  in 
January  and  nine  in  February;  also  that  she  wrote 

Page   Three   Hundred   Twenty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

and  published  six  lengthy  newspaper  articles  on 
suffrage,  direct  legislation  and  prohibition.  This, 
besides  making  a  study  of  several  distinct  species 
of  the  cacti  of  that  locality  and  writing  a  number  of 
papers  regarding  that  desert  product  for  scientific 
publications. 


Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty-Eight 


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CHAPTER  THIRTY 

Return    to    Seattle;    the    Prohibition    Campaign; 

Trustee  on  Library  Board;  the  Western 

Woman's  Outlook 

MISS  FIELDE  returned  to  Seattle  from  Ari- 
zona in  the  spring  of  1912.  Quite  a  num- 
ber of  things  of  more  than  local  importance 
had  taken  place  in  Seattle  during  her  absence.  The 
moral  pendulum  of  the  city  had  swung  well  forward 
in  its  arc  of  oscillation  and  a  "reform* '  mayor  had 
been  elected.  In  1911  Mayor  Gill  had  been  recall- 
ed and  George  \V.  Dilling  was  elected  to  fill  the  un- 
expired  term  of  office.  At  the  biennial  city  elec- 
tion of  1912,  Mayor  Dilling  declined  to  again  be  a 
candidate,  and  George  F.  Cotterill  defeated  Hiram 
C.  Gill  in  a  close  contest.  The  women's  move- 
ment, which  Miss  Fielde  had  helped  set  in  motion, 
was  still  rolling  along  with  unabated  speed.  New 
advances  and  reforms  in  sanitation,  legislation 
and  social  economy  were  still  being  discussed,  agi- 
tated and  promoted  with  startling  rapidity.  A 
woman's  publishing  company  had  been  incorpora- 
ted under  the  laws  of  Washington  and  a  twenty-four 
page  weekly  newspaper,  the  Western  Woman's 
Outlook,  was  launched.  The  publication  was  edit- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Twenty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ed  and  managed  by  women  only,  and  the  stock- 
holders largely  represented  the  leadership  of  the 
social,  civic,  political  and  religious  organizations  of 
women  in  the  State  of  Washington.  Its  sphere  of 
usefulness  was  self-defined  as  the  mediumship  by 
which  the  attitude  of  organized  women  on  all  pub- 
lic questions  would  be  expressed  in  a  truthful  and 
reliable  way.  A  few  months  later  on,  it  came  to  be 
adopted  as  the  official  organ  of  publicity  for  the 
Washington  State  Federation  of  Women's  Clubs. 
Miss  Fielde  was  delighted  with  the  newspaper  and 
from  thence  forward  she  was  a  regular  contributor 
to  its  pages  during  the  whole  period  of  its  three 
years'  existence. 

April  2nd,  1912,  Mayor  Cotterill  appointed  Miss 
Fielde  a  trustee  of  the  Seattle  public  library.  Aside 
from  the  high  honor  she  received,  she  was  especial- 
ly distinguished  as  the  first  Seattle  woman  to  be  ap- 
pointed to  a  political  office.  In  a  letter  to  one  of 
her  eastern  correspondents  she  tells  of  her  prefer- 
ment and  expressed  her  appreciation  of  the 
mayor's  act.  On  April  24th  she  wrote: 

"Since  I  came  from  Arizona,  (arriving  March 
30th),  I  have  been  a  *city  official*  and  on  that  fact 
was  based  my  attendance  at  an  informal,  very  in- 
formal, dinner,  last  evening,  where  fifty  persons 
were  present,  and  I  the  only  woman  among  them. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty 


Return  to  Seattle;  Prohibition  Campaign 

It  was  a  gathering  of  the  official  family  of  the  new 
mayor,  Mr.  Cotterill,  whose  election  and  the  decent 
government  it  assures,  was  the  work  of  the  women 
voters  of  this  city.  I  had  scarcely  taken  off  my 
traveling  wraps,  when  I  was  informed  that  I  had 
been  selected  to  fill  a  vacancy  on  the  board  of  trust- 
ees of  the  public  library,  and  there  seemed  to  be 
sound  reasons  why  I  should  accept.  What 
with  this  bran-new  occupation,  cleaning  house, 
giving  two  afternoon  talks  of  Arizona,  (one  in  a 
private  drawing  room  and  one  at  the  Woman's 
Club  house,  so  as  to  economize  tongue-wagging  for 
myself  in  lesser  circles,)  with  taking  bearings  on 
the  political  situations  that  are  going  to  appeal  to 
all  electors  during  the  coming  months,  and  the  cold 
breaths  of  perils  that  menace  my  friends  across  the 
sea,  I  have  had  to  leave  letter  writing  till  now. 

"Our  public  library  has  a  fine  central  site  and  a 
dignified  granite  building,  with  several  branches 
and  150,000  books.  Nearly  $200,000  a  year  is 
spent  by  the  city  in  its  maintenance.  There  are 
but  seven  trustees,  each  appointed  for  seven  years, 
without  remuneration.  I  am  already  on  three  com- 
mittees of  the  board,  *Art ;  *  'Books  and  Periodicals' 
and  'Branches.'  I  have  a  lot  of  literature  inform- 
ing me  concerning  my  duties,  the  attitude  I  should 
maintain  towards  my  work,  etc.,  and  I  am  gradual- 
ly discerning  my  sphere  of  individual  usefulness 
on  the  Board." 

During  the  years  1 91 2  and  1 91 3,  Miss  Fielde  de- 
voted herself  to  a  multiplicity  of  duties,  both  old 

Page    Three   Hundred    Thirty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

and  new.  She  was  greatly  interested  in  her  work 
as  a  trustee  of  the  Seattle  public  library  and  strove 
consistently  to  make  the  service  of  that  institution 
efficient  and  satisfactory.  She  herself  was  an  omni- 
verous  reader  and  possessed  unusual  catholicity  of 
taste  in  literature;  but  she  read  only  the  very  best 
of  the  several  kinds  of  books  and  periodicals  and 
was  especially  eager  that  all  booklovers  should  have 
the  full  advantage  of  her  knowledge  and  experience 
in  the  selection  of  reading  matter.  The 
shelves  of  the  Seattle  public  library  contain  many 
rare  volumns,  the  private  gift  of  Miss  Fielde,  for 
which  she  had  tried  and  failed  to  secure  appropria- 
tions from  the  library  funds  for  their  purchase. 

Besides  this  work  she  contributed  two  pages  a 
week  to  the  Legislative  Department  of  the  Western 
Woman's  Outlook',  served  as  the  official  corres- 
pondent of  the  Committee  of  One  Hundred  on  Na- 
tional Health  for  the  American  Association  for  the 
Advancement  of  Science;  was  an  active  member 
of  the  executive  council  of  the  Washington  State 
Committee  of  the  Progressive  Party  and  chairman 
of  the  women's  department;  presided  at  the  semi- 
monthly meetings  of  the  Washington  Women's 
Legislative  Committee  and  took  part  in  the  fort- 
nightly activities  of  the  Women's  Good  Govern- 
ment League.  The  foregoing  catalogues  her  regu- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty-Two 


Return  to  Seattle;  Prohibition  Campaign 

lar  work;  her  irregular  activities  demanding,  per- 
haps, equal  drafts  upon  her  time  and  efforts.  She 
wrote,  lectured  and  taught  with  almost  tireless  en- 
ergy concerning  a  great  variety  of  subjects — any- 
thing which  in  her  opinion  would  contribute  to  the 
sum  total  of  human  uplift  and  human  betterment. 

In  January,  1914,  an  active  campaign  for  state- 
wide prohibition  was  launched  in  Washington.  It 
was  here  that  the  first  instrument  of  direct  legisla- 
tion, the  Initiative,  was  first  employed  to  secure 
the  enactment  of  a  law.  The  initial  step  consisted 
in  circulating  petitions  for  signatures  favorable  to 
the  proposed  measure.  Miss  Fielde  enlisted  her 
whole  soul  and  wonderful  energy  in  the  work,  and 
throughout  the  entire  movement  maintained  a  lead- 
ing part.  In  a  diary  note,  dated  December  19th, 
1913,  she  describes  the  beginning  of  the  undertak- 
ing and  tells  of  some  of  her  own  achievements : 

"I  was,  at  my  own  request,  appointed  a  commit- 
tee of  one,  and  given  full  power  to  act  independ- 
ently, with  the  unanimous  consent  of  the  Washing- 
ton Women's  Legislative  Committee,  to  prepare 
and  issue  circulars  to  be  used  in  an  educational 
campaign  in  favor  of  state-wide  prohibition  of  the 
manufacture  and  sale  of  intoxicants.  I  began  the 
work  in  September,  wrote  three  circulars,  paid  for 
their  printing,  and  on  October  23rd.  the  addressing 
of  specially  printed  envelopes  began  in  the  office 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

of  the  Anti-Saloon  League.  To  address  the  envel- 
opes, women  were  employed  by  me  at  one  dollar 
and  a  half  a  day  for  sixty-two  days,  addressing 
forty  thousand  envelopes  and  stuffing  them  with 
the  circulars.  The  printing  of  fifty  thousand  of 
each  of  the  three  circulars  and  forty  thousand  en- 
velopes cost  me  three  hundred  and  seventy  dollars ; 
work  of  the  women  in  addressing  the  forty  thous- 
and envelopes,  ninety- three  dollars;  postage  on 
forty  thousand  packages,  four  hundred  dollars;  to- 
tal, eight  hundred  and  sixty-three  dollars.  My 
friend,  Mrs.  Chas.  M.  Shalkenbach  sent  me  fifty 
dollars  to  help  pay  for  the  office  work;  the  rest  of 
the  expense  I  met  myself.  I  have  also  given  five 
hundred  dollars  to  aid  the  Anti-Saloon  League  to 
print  the  Initiative  petitions.  The  forty  thousand 
packages  will  be  mailed  January  2nd,  1914,  to 
women  voters  in  the  State ;  the  remaining  ten  thou- 
sand will  be  distributed  by  hand." 

The  result  of  the  Prohibition  campaign  in  the 
State  of  Washington  was  a  great  triumph  to  the 
cause  of  temperance.  The  Initiative  petitions  con- 
tained over  one  hundred  and  twelve  thousand  sig- 
natures, though  only  thirty-two  thousand  were 
needed  to  comply  with  the  law;  and  the  referen- 
dum vote,  cast  November  6th,  1914,  sustained  the 
measure  by  nineteen  thousand  majority. 

The  victory,  however,  was  not  bloodless  or  easily 
won.  The  liquor  forces  made  a  hard  fight,  employ- 
Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty-Four 


Return  to  Seattle;  Prohibition  Campaign 

ing  a  corruption  fund  that  has  been  variously  estima- 
ted from  five  hundred  thousand  to  three  million 
dollars.  Whatever  the  amount  expended,  huge 
sums  were  used  in  the  purchase  of  newspaper  in- 
fluence ;  bribing  voters,  directly  and  indirectly ;  cor- 
rupting election  officials;  and  putting  into  practice 
those  many  dishonest  schemes  by  which  wily  poli- 
ticians defeat  the  will  of  the  law-abiding  people 
and  elect  unworthy  candidates  to  public  office.  In 
consonance  with  this  implied  program  of  activity, 
Hiram  C.  Gill  was  for  the  third  time  elected  mayor 
of  Seattle.  Under  Gill's  administration  the  power 
of  the  municipal  police  force,  the  prestige  of  the 
city  officials  and  the  cunning  of  the  criminal  ele- 
ment were  alike  used  effectively  to  defeat  the  Pro- 
hibition measure.  Seattle  was  about  the  only  lo- 
cality in  Washington  that  gave  a  very  decided 
majority  against  Prohibition,  but  that  was  far  from 
being  large  enough  to  overcome  the  favorable  vote 
of  the  smaller  cities  and  rural  districts  of  the  State. 
As  one  of  the  results  of  her  political  activity  in 
behalf  of  Prohibition,  Miss  Fielde  was  ousted  from 
her  office  as  a  trustee  on  the  Seattle  Public  Library 
Board.  Mr.  Gill  removed  her  a  few  days  after 
being  reinstalled  as  mayor  of  Seattle.  The  West- 
ern Woman's  Outlook  referred  to  the  incident  in 
an  editorial,  from  which  the  following  is  taken: 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"Mayor  Gill's  removal  of  Miss  Adele  M.  Fielde 
from  the  Seattle  Library  Commission  was  not  at  all 
unexpected.  Beyond  the  kinship  of  race,  there  is 
nothing  in  common  between  the  newly  elected 
mayor  and  the  lately  removed  commissioner.  Miss 
Fielde  is  truly  representative  of  that  small  group  of 
individuals  to  whom  social  service,  moral  enlight- 
enment and  human  welfare  are  the  paramount  pur- 
poses of  life.  She  is  a  woman  of  international  rep- 
utation, eminent  as  an  author,  scientist  and  edu- 
cator. To  her  interest  and  activity  in  library  work 
the  credit  of  the  many  recent  improvements  and 
advancements  in  the  Seattle  Public  Library  is  large- 
ly due.  On  the  other  hand,  Mayor  Gill  is  a  local 
politician.  To  him  efficiency  in  public  service 
means  ability  to  secure  votes.  Presumably  he 
knows  nothing  of  the  upbuilding  and  upkeep  of  a 
public  library  and  cares  very  little  more.  The  City 
Charter  gives  him  the  power  to  make  a  certain  class 
of  appointments  and  to  remove  the  same  class  of 
appointees  at  will.  That  Miss  Fielde's  removal 
from  the  sphere  of  usefulness  to  which  she  is  so 
well  adapted  to  fill,  is  sincerely  deplored  as  has 
been  already  well  attested.  Over  one-half  of  the 
women's  organizations  of  Seattle  have  made  of- 
ficial protests  against  the  mayor's  action,  and  pub- 
lic feeling  is  such  that  many  others  will  probably 
do  so  in  the  near  future." 

Another  sacrifice,  which  Miss  Fielde  regarded 
as  a  personal  loss,  was  the  martyrdom  of  the  West- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty-Six 


Return  to  Seattle;  Prohibition  Campaign 

ern  Woman's  Outlook.  Because  of  its  aggressive 
and  fearless  activity  against  the  liquor  interest,  the 
Outlook  gained  the  reputation  of  being  the  leading 
newspaper  champion  of  Prohibition  in  the  State. 
It  also  attracted  the  hostile  attention  of  the  Liquor 
Dealers  Political  Association,  which  proved  its  un- 
doing. By  means  of  stock  manipulation,  involving 
treachery,  partisanship  and  some  highly  discred- 
itable professional  tactics  on  the  part  of  sev- 
eral lawyers,  agents  of  the  saloon  interests  secured 
the  legal  right  to  the  Outlook's  management.  But 
before  the  actual  control  had  passed,  the  journal 
was  practically  wrecked.  In  a  diary  note  of  Sep- 
tember 3rd,  1914,  Miss  Fielde  refers  to  the  incident 
in  the  following  terms: 

"Western  Woman's  Outlook,  the  Washington 
club  women's  organ  of  publicity,  is  now  in  peril.  It 
did  such  valiant  service  in  the  Prohibition  campaign 
that  the  liquor  traffic  set  are  striving  to  destroy  it. 
By  the  liberal  use  of  their  great  corruption  fund,  by 
bribing  women,  lawyers  and  courts,  the  brave  little 
paper  may  not  be  able  to  hold  out  against  the 
machinations  of  the  enemy." 

One  of  the  conditions  of  the  Prohibition  referen- 
dum provided  that,  if  sustained,  it  was  not  to  go 
into  effect  for  two  years,  or  until  January,  1916. 
During  this  interval  the  matter  was  taken  into  the 

Page   Three  Hundred   Thirty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

courts  by  the  liquor  interests  in  hopes  of  defeating 
its  final  enactment  into  law.  This  placed  an  addi- 
tional, and  apparently,  an  enormous  expense  upon 
the  friends  of  Prohibition.  Miss  Fielde  alone  con- 
tributed five  hundred  dollars  as  her  share  of  the  bur- 
den of  defending  this  action  at  law.  In  one  of  her 
diary  notes,  entered  December,  1916,  she  writes: 
"I  put  nine  hundred  dollars  into  the  Prohibition 
campaign  of  the  Washington  Women's  Legislative 
Committee;  five  hundred  dollars  into  the  work  of 
the  Anti-Saloon  League;  gave  five  hundred  dollars 
to  the  expense  of  defending  the  court  action ;  mak- 
ing a  total  of  nineteen  hundred  dollars." 

But  in  the  achievement  of  so  great  an  object, 
Miss  Fielde  did  not  count  the  cost.  She  regarded 
the  expenditure  of  time  and  money  as  insignificant 
compared  with  the  future  benefits  that  would  ac- 
crue to  humanity.  This  thought  is  expressed  in  an 
exchange  of  letters  at  the  time  the  Prohibition  law 
became  effective  with  Mr.  C.  Allen  Dale,  the  latter 
then  a  city  councilman  of  Seattle.  On  that  occa- 
sion Mr.  Dale  wrote: 

"My  Dear  Miss  Fielde: 

"I  wish  you  a  happy  New  Year  and  many  more 
to  come.  I  also  wish  to  congratulate  you  on  the 
part  taken  in  the  Prohibition  movement  as  I  know 
of  the  strength  you  must  have  expended  in  that 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty-Eight 


Return  to  Seattle;  Prohibition  Campaign 

work.  Although  we  business  men  cannot  agree  as 
to  whether  it  is  the  practical  thing  to  do,  at  the  same 
time  we  realize,  as  you  made  the  statement  to  me  at 
one  time,  that  it  will  probably  work  out  to  the  great 
advantage  of  our  children.  I  hope  the  influence 
that  you  good  women  exert  will  result  in  better 
government  for  the  people  so  that  nearer  justice 
may  be  done  one  toward  the  other. 
"Yours  truly, 

"G  Allen  Dale." 

To  which  Miss  Fielde  replied: 

44My  Dear  Mr.  Dale: 

44I  thank  you  for,  and  heartily  reciprocate,  your 
kindly  wish  that  I  may  have  a  happy  year. 

44I  have  never  worked  harder  for  any  public  good 
than  for  state-wide  prohibition  in  Washington.  All 
along  I  have  had  a  vision  of  two  possible  evenings 
for  a  Washington  woman  in  the  future.  In  the 
one,  she  waits  and  listens  to  see  how  badly  her  hus- 
band staggers  as  he  approaches  the  home  at  a  late 
hour;  in  the  other,  she  watches  joyously  for  his 
coming  at  the  end  of  the  day's  work,  confident  of 
sane  companionship.  If  just  one  woman,  ten  years 
hence,  awaits  her  husband  with  serenity  rather  than 
with  anxiety  as  to  his  condition,  that  alone  will  pay 
me  for  all  that  I  have  done  to  further  prohibition. 
And  then  there  are  the  little  children  that  will  have 
more  food  and  better  clothing;  and  the  mothers 
who  will  find  it  easier  to  rear  their  sons  to  right 
lives. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Thirty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

"Within  ten  years,  'we,  the  people'  of  Washing- 
ton, have  gained  equal  suffrage;  the  initiative  and 
referendum;  the  red  light  abatement,  and  the  pro- 
hibition law,  with  several  other  good  enactments — 
Hallelujah,  Amen. 

"I  herewith  enclose  a  printed  sheet  that  will  tell 
you  of  a  little  plan  that  I  made,  some  months  ago 
for  the  help  of  young  mothers.  The  work  is  being 
carried  on  by  the  Mother's  Congress.  It  is  highly 
commended  by  the  health  commissioners  and  the 
school  officers.  I  am  hoping  that  it  may  soon  be 
taken  up  by  the  Health  Department  so  that  the 
pamphlet  committee  will  not  have  to  raise  the 
money,  as  well  as  do  all  the  work  involved. 

"I  share  your  right  aspiration  that  'justice  may 
be  done,  one  toward  the  other.' 

"Sincerely  yours, 

"Adele  M.  Fielde." 


Page  Three  Hundred   Forty 


CHAPTER  THIRTY-ONE 
Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

HAVING  no  family  ties  to  bind  her,  Miss 
Fielde  formed  attachments  of  friendship 
that  were  exceptionally  strong.  Not  every 
one,  however,  was  so  fortunate  as  to  gain  an  en- 
trance to  the  charmed  circle  of  her  esteem.  She  se- 
lected her  friends  as  carefully  and  cautiously  as  she 
did  everything  else.  A  person  must  be  necessarily 
distinguished  in  some  way  in  order  to  attract  her 
attention  and  secure  her  confidence — must  possess 
exceptional  attributes  of  personality,  rare  traits  of 
character  or  elements  that  make  for  social  leader- 
ship. But  once  having  gained  her  interest  or  affec- 
tion, nothing  short  of  a  positive  violation  of  one  or 
more  of  the  cardinal  principles  of  her  moral  or  ethi- 
cal code  would  serve  to  alienate  her  friendship. 

Perhaps  the  strongest  friendship  of  her  life  was 
that  existing  between  herself  and  Mrs.  William  A 
Cauldwell,  of  New  York  City.  Her  first  meeting 
with  this  lady  took  place  sometime  in  1870,  on 
Miss  Fielde's  return  from  Siam.  At  that  time  the 
latter  had  been  engaged  to  deliver  a  series  of  lec- 
tures at  the  First  Baptist  Church  of  New  York,  of 
which  Mr.  Cauldwell  was  the  Sunday-School  sup- 
erintendent and  Mrs.  Cauldwell  one  of  its  most 

Page  Three  Hundred  Forty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

active  members.  On  this  occasion  the  returned 
missionary  was  entertained  at  the  home  of  the 
Cauldwells  and  the  friendship  thus  begun  endured 
for  forty  years. 

The  five  Cauldwell  children,  at  this  time,  were 
quite  young  and  proved  a  source  of  constant  pleas- 
ure to  Miss  Fielde  during  her  visit.  They  were 
each  of  a  distinctively  American  type,  alert,  inde- 
pendent, though  somewhat  in  awe  of  their  visitor 
because  of  her  wisdom  and  renown.  There  was 
such  a  refreshing  difference  between  them  and  the 
phlegmatic  young  Chinese  that  Miss  Fielde  was  de- 
lighted and  practically  adopted  the  whole  brood. 
From  that  time  on  she  watched  each  of  them  ma- 
ture and  grow  into  manhood  or  womanhood  with 
as  much  maternal  concern  as  if  they  were  her  own ; 
even  transmitting  her  interest  and  affection  to  the 
offspring  of  the  second  generation — the  grand- 
children of  her  early  friend. 

When  Miss  Fielde  visited  the  Cauldwells  on  her 
second  vacation,  the  children  were  considerably 
older.  They  had  nearly  forgotten  their  mother's 
friend,  about  their  only  remaining  impressions  be- 
ing her  dignified  personality  and  religious  earnest- 
ness. On  being  told  that  Miss  Fielde  was  again  to 
be  a  guest  at  their  home,  the  young  people  failed 
to  anticipate  pleasure  in  that  prospect.  To  use  a 

Page  Three  Hundred  Forty-Two 


Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

quotation  from  one  of  them,  recently  expressed, 
they  half  expected  that  the  most  proper  behavior 
would  be  exacted  during  her  stay  and  that  much 
time  would  have  to  be  spent  in  praying  for  the 
heathen.  Nor  were  their  misgivings  allayed  at  the 
appearance  of  their  visitor,  dressed  as  she  was  in  a 
sort  of  Mother  Hubbard  gown  of  her  own  construc- 
tion, obviously  intended  for  comfort  only.  But 
disillusionment  and  relief  did  come  upon  Miss 
Fielde  declaring  her  intention  to  celebrate  her  home- 
coming by  attending  Barnum's  circus,  then  exhibit- 
ing in  Brooklyn,  to  which  she  invited  the  whole 
family  to  accompany  her. 

While  sight-seeing  at  the  circus  an  amusing  in- 
cident occured.  Miss  Fielde  found  a  former  ac- 
quaintance in  the  person  of  the  Chinese  Giant, 
whom  she  had  known  in  China,  and  with  whom  she 
entered  into  an  animated  conversation.  This  unpro- 
grammed  feature  of  the  entertainment  attracted 
considerable  attention  from  the  onlookers,  especi- 
ally so  on  the  part  of  a  small  child  which  excitedly 
shrilled  out,  "See,  mamma,  the  Fat  Lady  is  talking 
to  the  Giant."  Miss  Fielde  heartily  joined  in  the 
laugh  at  her  own  expense  that  followed,  which 
served  to  cement  the  feeling  of  affectionate  com- 
radeship that  existed  between  the  young  people  and 
herself  from  that  time  on. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Forty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

During  nearly  the  whole  period  of  Miss  Fielde's 
missionary  service  she  was  in  receipt  of  constant 
help  and  advice  from  Mrs.  Cauldwell.  This  truth 
is  beautifully  reaffirmed  in  the  dedication  of  her 
book,  "A  Corner  of  Cathay/*  which  reads  thus: 

"To  Mrs.  E.  M.  Cauldwell, 

whose  patient  love,  steadfast  as  the  stars, 

self-lighted  far  away, 

Illumined  for  me,  through  all  the  years 

My  Corner  of  Cathay." 

Mrs.  Cauldwell  contributed  generous  financial 
aid  to  all  of  Miss  Fielde's  projects  of  missionary  im- 
provements and  advancements  in  the  Far  East.  It 
is  conceded  by  those  in  a  position  to  know,  that  the 
maintenance  of  the  Biblewomen  plan  and  the  es- 
tablishment of  the  Training  School  for  Chinese 
women  would  have  been  exceedingly  difficult  if  not 
impossible  but  for  her  assistance.  She  also  made 
substantial  donations  to  many  of  the  buildings  of 
the  missionary  compound  at  Swatow  and  she  is  en- 
titled to  the  credit  of  supplying  the  entire  cost  of 
building  Fielde  Lodge.  It  was  Mrs.  Cauldwell  who 
originated  the  plan  of  the  Drawing  Room  lectures, 
which  Miss  Fielde  delivered  on  her  final  return  from 
China  and  which  proved  of  such  inestimable  value 
to  a  large  number  of  New  York  women.  In  this 
she  conferred  a  great  benefaction  upon  Miss  Fielde. 
It  not  only  gave  her  well  paid  employment  but  was 
the  means  of  bringing  her  in  contact  with  persons 

Page   Three   Hundred    Forty-Four 


Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

of  wealth  and  culture  who  subsequently  aided  her 
to  establish  herself  in  other  and  broader  fields  of 
activity. 

This  latter  action  was  one  of  purely  disinterest- 
ed friendship.  The  bond  of  sympathy  between  the 
two  women  had  its  origin  in  their  affiliations  with 
the  Baptist  church,  to  which,  in  the  beginning, 
they  were  both  strongly  attached.  But  in  the  long 
stretches  of  time  in  which  they  had  lived  apart,  Miss 
Fielde  had  gradually  discarded  the  tenets  of  her 
former  religious  faith,  while  Mrs.  Cauldwell  re- 
mained an  orthodox  Christian.  Under  such  cir- 
cumstances, it  would  be  only  natural  that  feelings 
usually  described  as  "strained  relations"  should 
have  resulted  from  Miss  Fielde's  divergence  from 
the  common  religious  path  they  had  both  followed 
so  long  and  faithfully,  but  such  was  not  the  case. 
Dr.  Charles  M.  Cauldwell,  son  of  Mrs.  Cauldwell, 
quite  young  at  that  time,  tells  of  the  first  meeting 
of  the  friends  after  this  momentous  event  had  taken 
place.  "When  Miss  Fielde  returned  from  abroad, " 
he  said,  "she  came  directly  to  our  home.  After  the 
customary  greetings,  she  and  Mother  retired  to  the 
privacy  of  an  unoccupied  room  and  had  a  long  talk, 
the  substance  and  nature  of  which  never  has  been 
disclosed.  On  their  reappearance  in  the  family 
room,  both  were  serene  and  both  seemed  satisfied." 

Page  Three  Hundred  Forty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

As  before  stated,  Miss  Fielde's  affections  were 
not  limited  to  a  single  generation  of  the  Cauldwell 
family.  In  the  later  years  of  her  life  she  was  great- 
ly attached  to  the  wife  and  children  of  Samuel  Mil- 
bank  Cauldwell,  son  of  Mrs.  William  A.  Cauldwell. 
She  expressed  her  sentiments  for  this  branch  of  the 
family  in  a  letter  written  to  Mrs.  Samuel  Milbank 
Cauldwell,  dated  October  6,  1914,  as  follows: 

"I  have  heaps  of  enjoyment  in  your  new  house; 
in  its  spaciousness  and  comfort,  and  in  the  fact  that 
it  is  your  own,  after  you  have  made  it  to  your  mind. 
It  is  good  for  the  dear  children  to  have  through 
their  lives  the  memory  of  a  permanent  home,  where 
a  tree,  a  toad  and  an  ant-hill  were  close  acquaint- 
ances. I  have  now  on  my  table  a  little  plant  that 
folds  up  its  broad,  spotted  leaves  and  goes  to  sleep 
about  my  bed-time  and  wakes  up  and  stretches 
while  I  am  eating  my  breakfast.  It  is  a  sort  of  com- 
panion. Give  my  special  love  to  each  of  your 
children;  of  whom  I  think  often,  trying  to  follow 
their  growth  and  new  attainments.  All  that  you 
write  of  them  interests  me  greatly — Olivia,  and  the 
school  which  will  prepare  her  more  solidly  for  col- 
lege; Katherine,  and  her  heart-attracting  helpful- 
ness ;  William,  and  his  finely-cherished  ideals ;  Paul- 
ine, and  her  winsome  ways.  Bless  the  dear  four, 
and  you  in  your  care  of  them.  I  am  so  glad  to  hear 
that  Milbank  is  stronger.  You  are  indeed  a  fortun- 
ate woman  to  have  such  a  family  as  you  have.  Not 
all  who  deserve  the  best  get  it." 

Page    Three   Hundred   Forty-Six 


Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

While  wintering  in  Tucson,  Arizona,  Miss  Fielde 
received  the  news  of  Mrs.  William  A.  Cauldwell's 
serious  illness.  Under  date  of  December  1 5th, 
1911,  she  replied  to  a  letter  written  by  Mrs.  Ed- 
ward M.  Foote,  Mrs.  Cauldwell's  daughter,  as  fol- 
lows : 

"Dear  Kittie:* 

"I  am  grateful  for  your  letter  of  the  8th  inst.  I 
had  begun  to  be  anxious  because  there  was  delay  in 
the  coming  of  any  letter  from  your  dear  mother. 
You  write  hopefully  concerning  her  regaining  of 
strength,  and  it  is  comforting  that  the  Doctor  thinks 
she  may  get  about  again  in  a  few  weeks. 

"Dear  Kittie,  did  you  ever  think  what  courage 
is  required  for  the  meeting  of  age?  In  a  typhoon, 
an  earthquake,  a  malignant  disease,  or  any  com- 
mon disaster,  there  is  always  hope  of  such  an  escape 
as  will  end  in  complete  restoration  of  the  usual  con- 
ditions. But  when  one  has  reached  old  age,  no 
hope  of  restoration  to  the  activities  of  youth  is  per- 
missible. One  must  face  the  fact,  and  make  the 
best  of  it,  without  hope!  This  world  no  longer  of- 
fers a  future,  glittering  with  possible  betterment. 
I  am  an  exceptionally  happy  woman;  but  I  am 
aware  that  no  past  peril  was  destitute  of  hope,  and 
that  my  present  tranquil  and  comfortable  state, 
lacks  the  glamour  that  has  illumined  preceding 
years.  It  is  good  to  live  many  decades,  because 
each  decade  brings  knowledge  that  no  earlier  one 

*The  name  used  by  Miss  Fielde  alone  for  Mrs.  Foote. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Forty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

had  capacity  to  grasp.  Now  I  know  how  I  have 
failed  to  comprehend  much  that  was  near  me,  and 
that  I  might  have  mended  by  comprehension. 

"Christmas  will  bring  me  many  thoughts  of  you 
and  yours,  as  did  Thanksgiving.  Were  I  just  a  little 
stronger,  I  should  try  to  journey  to  New  York,  with 
this  imperative  want  that  I  feel  to  see  my  dear 
friend,  your  mother.  But  I  am  withheld  with  the 
fear  and  probability  that  I  should  myself  be  a  care 
to  her.  Since  I  came  here  my  bronchial  ailment 
has  lessened  and  I  believe  that  it  may  disappear  in 
this  arid  air  in  two  or  three  months  more.  I  had 
become  strangely  weak;  and  I  am  getting  stronger. 
In  order  to  occupy  my  mind  with  something  out- 
of-doors,  I  am  making  a  superficial  study  of  the 
cacti,  an  order  of  plants  that  have  in  this  region 
their  greatest  development. 

"I  shall  depend  on  you  to  keep  me  informed  re- 
garding the  progress  made  by  our  dear  invalid.  Give 
her  much  love  from  me  and  say  that  I  shall  soon 
write  to  her.  Do  not  consider  plain  postal  cards 
beneath  my  grateful  recognition.  I  know  you  are 
busy  and  that  the  wee  ones,  dear  Kittie,  must  have 
most  of  your  minutes." 

In  April,  1912,  while  living  in  Seattle,  Miss 
Fielde  received  news  of  Mrs.  Cauldwell's  death. 
Later  on  she  wrote  a  beautiful  tribute  to  the  mem- 
ory of  her  friend  in  reply  to  a  request  from  Mrs. 
Edward  M.  Foote,  asking  for  any  letter  written  by 
the  latter's  mother  that  might  be  in  Miss  Fielde's 

Page  Three  Hundred  Forty-Eight 


Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

possession.     Parts  of  the  tribute  are  herein  repro- 
duced : 

"Dearest  Kittie: 

"I  think  I  should  have  kept  all  of  your  mother's 
dear  letters,  had  I  ever  believed  that  she  would  go 
before  me  to  our  next  world.  Knocked  about  as 
I  have  been,  between  soft  pillows  and  hard  posts, 
maintaining  always  a  happy  sense  that,  whatever 
happened,  she  was  at  her  beautiful  house,  ready  to 
welcome,  advise,  or  console  me,  I  have  never  made 
any  provisions  for  being  without  her.  Her  letters, 
sure  to  come,  sure  to  be  bright,  loving  and  satisfy- 
ing, were  always  about  immediate  concerns.  She 
wrote  little  about  herself,  and  never  expatiated  up- 
on books,  theories,  or  public  affairs.  When  I  had 
read  them  a  few  times  and  answered  them,  I  began 
to  think  when  she  and  I  would  next  meet,  and 
sprinkled  the  latest  letter  into  the  waste-basket. 
Therefore  I  have  but  two  letters  of  hers  remaining 
and  I  am  sending  them  to  you,  herein  enclosed.  I 
have  kept  only  a  scrap  of  her  handwriting,  you  are 
the  one  to  keep  permanently  this  last  record  that 
she  made  of  what  your  children  had  said.  She 
knew  that  I  liked  to  hear  about  her  grandchildren, 
and  seldom  failed  to  insert  in  her  letters  to  me  some 
amusing  account  of  their  doings. 

"I  know  whatever  I  can  write  concerning  her 
lovely  life,  but  when  I  try  to  narrate  something,  I 
can  only  think  how  perfect  a  friend  she  was;  how 
utterly  reliable  in  every  time  of  need;  how  appre- 

Pagre  Three  Hundred  Forty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ciative  of  every  good  trait  in  others.  She  was  faith- 
ful unto  death.  I  conceive  of  no  friendship  more 
flawless  than  hers  and  mine.  In  all  the  forty  years 
there  was  never  a  moment  of  distrust  or  misunder- 
standing. We  never  had  anything  to  explain;  we 
had  always  much  to  tell.  She  wrote  no  books ;  she 
was  not  a  leader  in  public  undertakings:  she  pro- 
jected no  new  philosophy  of  life.  But  minute  by 
minute  she  was  doing  good  and  the  results  went 
into  that  great  sum,  that  keeps  the  human  family 
from  sinking  into  a  slough  of  despond.  May  your 
children  be  like  her,  because  of  an  inbred  inherit- 
ance of  the  finest  qualities  that  can  be  handed  down 
to  one's  posterity.** 

Mrs.  William  A.  Cauldwell  died  April  24th, 
1912.  Under  a  newspaper  clipping  announcing 
her  death,  contained  in  one  of  Miss  Fielde's  diaries, 
the  following  comments  are  written : 

"My  very  soul  is  bereft  by  her  departure.  For 
forty  years  we  were  friends  and  no  cloud  ever  came 
between  our  hearts.  Without  her,  this  world  never 
can  be  so  good  a  place  for  me  to  live  in.  She  never 
once  failed  me  in  fidelity  or  affection.  A.  M.  F.*' 

Another  very  strong  attachment  was  that  exist- 
ing between  Miss  Fielde  and  Mrs.  William  Pierson 
Hamilton,  of  New  York.  The  two  women  first  met 
on  business,  Mrs.  Hamilton  having  gone  to  consult 
Miss  Fielde  and  employ  her  to  write  a  constitution 
for  a  New  York  charity  in  which  the  former  was 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty 


Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

then  interested.  This  task  entailed  several  meetings ; 
and  the  mutual  attraction  felt  from  the  beginning 
developed  rapidly  into  a  friendship  that  was  an  in- 
spiration and  help  to  both  sides.  Miss  Fielde  was 
then  well  advanced  in  life;  her  judgment  ripened 
by  age  and  contact  with  the  many  phases  and  forms 
of  human  experience ;  Mrs.  Hamilton  was  a  young 
matron,  enthusiastically  engaged  in  the  activities 
and  responsibilities  of  modern  motherhood.  The 
latter  sometimes  found  herself  facing  problems  of 
unusual  complexity;  and,  on  such  occasions,  she 
sought  Miss  Fielde's  advice.  This  she  found  invari- 
ably sound  and  helpful  as  a  rule,  and  in  course  of 
time,  grew  to  depend  on  her  friend's  counsel  and 
wisdom.  In  a  recent  letter,  Mrs.  Hamilton  writes: 

"Miss  Fielde  had  a  positive  genius  for  friend- 
ship. Her  talents  in  this  direction  won  her  deep 
and  abiding  love  from  many  separated  by  the  cir- 
cumstances of  age,  of  living  and  of  environment. 
She  had  an  eternal  youthfulness  of  heart  and  soul 
which  made  the  difference  in  our  ages  quite  neglig- 
ible; while  her  wide  experience  made  her  friend- 
ship of  infinite  value  to  me.  She  was  frequently 
at  the  Hamilton  home  and  her  influence  and  inspi- 
ration were  experienced  by  the  Hamilton  children 
as  well  as  by  their  mother.  They  found  her  as  eag- 
erly interested  in  their  lives  as  they  were  them- 
selves; and  in  addition  she  had  the  power  to  make 
the  commonplace  world  around  them  as  fascinating 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

as  fairyland.  Ants,  for  instance,  she  could  turn 
into  human  beings  with  funny  little  individualities 
and  characteristics  of  their  own.  No  part  of  the 
earth  was  so  remote  that  she  could  not  make  it  near 
and  real;  and  no  child  could  listen  to  her  charming 
collection  of  horrible  tales  of  experiences  in  China 
and  Siam  without  being  thrilled.  When  she  went 
West  her  letters  were  a  constant  source  of  delight, 
they  were  so  full  of  the  new  and  wonderful  experi- 
ences she  was  living;  and  the  old  ties  were  never 
forgotten  or  neglected. 

"I  visited  Miss  Fielde  in  Seattle  and  we  had  a 
truly  joyous  time.  Our  affection  for  each  other 
was  just  as  fresh  as  when  at  the  acme  of  its  devel- 
opment. We  spent  three  delightful  days  together, 
one  of  which  was  on  a  motor  trip  to  Snoqualmie 
Falls,  where  we  picnicked  and  returned  to  Seattle 
in  a  glorious  sunset. 

"We  never  met  again,  though  we  corresponded 
until  her  death.  One  of  my  most  cherished  posses- 
sions is  a  letter  she  wrote  me  when  she  knew  she 
was  dying.  Its  contents  expressed  the  same  steady 
bravery,  the  same  great  hopefulness  that  made  her 
an  inspiration  to  everyone  who  knew  and  loved 
her." 

The  friendship  between  Miss  Fielde  and  Dr.  Ed- 
ward J.  Nolan  had  its  origin  in  the  sentiments  of 
gratitude  which  the  former  entertained  for  the  lat- 
ter, but  it  grew  and  ripened  into  a  much  broader 
field  of  interest.  Dr.  Nolan  is  the  secretary  and  li- 

Pagre  Three  Hundred  Fifty-Two 


Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

brarian  of  the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  of 
Philadelphia,  having  been  in  those  positions  many 
years  before  Miss  Fielde  studied  Natural  History 
at  the  Academy  in  1 885-6.  It  was  largely  due  to 
his  interest  that  she  entered  the  institution  as  a 
student,  the  account  of  which  has  been  told  in  a 
previous  chapter. 

Miss  Fielde  and  Dr.  Nolan  were  congenial  and 
companionable.  They  were  both  exceptional  per- 
sonalities; their  respective  characters  had  been  de- 
veloped along  similar  lines  of  culture.  Both  were 
highly  artistic,  both  devoted  to  scientific  pursuits 
and  both  gifted  writers.  After  Miss  Fielde  left  the 
Academy  the  friends  did  not  meet  again  except  for 
short  visits  at  long  intervals,  but  they  communicat- 
ed with  each  other  by  an  exchange  of  letters  at  short 
intervals  for  thirty  years. 

It  is  largely  due  to  the  letters  written  by  Miss 
Fielde  to  Dr.  Nolan,  that  the  writer  is  enabled  to 
depict  the  more  intimate  side  of  Miss  Fielde's  char- 
acter, to  relate  many  incidents  of  a  personal  as  well 
as  public  nature  and  to  follow  her  through  nearly 
every  civilized  country  on  the  globe.  The  letters 
themselves  are  of  genuine  literary  value,  contain- 
ing as  they  do  the  views  of  a  trained  observer,  the 
opinions  of  a  logical  mind  and  conclusions  that  in- 
dicate a  rare  gift  of  analysis.  Many  of  them  are 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

written  in  a  spirit  of  quiet  humor,  with  which  the 
writer  was  often  inspired,  and  others  are  filled  with 
sparkling  repartee,  obviously  called  forth  by  some 
sally  on  the  part  of  her  correspondent.  But  the 
greater  share  of  them  contain  only  plain  statements 
of  fact  and  opinion,  Miss  Fielde's  most  notable 
style  of  expression. 

Mrs.  Rose  Reed  McBride,  wife  of  Mr.  F.  T.  Mc- 
Bride,  of  Portland,  Oregon,  was  another  of  Miss 
Fielde's  cherished  friends.  Their  first  meeting  took 
place  in  1911  and  thereafter  they  kept  in  touch  with 
each  other  by  exchanging  letters  and  by  an  occa- 
sional visit  until  Miss  Fielde's  death  in  1916.  Mrs. 
McBride  tells  of  their  friendship,  its  beginning  and 
progress,  in  a  charming  letter  to  the  writer  hereof, 
dated  December  1  1th,  1916.  Her  letter  is  here  re- 
produced as  follows: 

"Thank  you  for  including  me  in  the  category  of 
Miss  Fielde's  intimate  friends.  There  was  a  mutual 
attraction,  I  think,  from  the  start.  A  few  days 
after  we  met  in  Tucson,  Arizona,  she  said  to  me  'I 
would  liked  to  have  been  your  mother.'  The  com- 
pliment, coming  as  it  did  from  such  a  fine  and  won- 
derful source,  could  not  otherwise  than  impress 
me  highly. 

44 We  spent  two  months  in  Tucson,  meeting  every 
day.  We  both  loved  the  sunshine,  the  mystic  haze 
of  the  desert  and  the  grandeur  of  the  canyons.  Once 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty-Four 


Intimate  Friendships;  Social  Incidents 

we  spent  a  whole  day  in  one  of  these  beautiful  na- 
tural chambers,  she  seemed  so  carefree,  enjoying 
making  coffee  on  the  campfire  and  doing  a  lot  of 
other  happy  things.  She  spent  much  time  at  the 
University  studying  the  cactus  family.  On  one  of 
our  trips  to  the  canyon,  she  spoke  of  a  belated  trav- 
eler who  had  been  refreshed  and  probably  saved  by 
extracting  and  drinking  the  water  of  a  mammil- 
larian  cactus.  So  we  experimented  and  by  hard 
labor  found  we  could  get  enough  water  from  the 
plants  to  quench  thirst.  She  loved  to  try  things 
out. 

44 We  parted  at  Tucson  and  did  not  meet  again 
for  over  a  year,  but  we  exchanged  letters  regularly 
from  that  time  on.  In  October,  1915,  we  attended 
the  Panama  Exposition  at  San  Francisco  together. 
She  has  often  remarked  since  then  that  our  com- 
panionship on  this  occasion  had  been  one  of  great 
pleasure  to  her.  The  California  weather  was  per- 
fect, the  sky  cloudless  and  the  sea  air  sweet  and 
balmy.  We  took  breakfast  together  every  morn- 
ing, then  strolled  a  couple  of  hours  over  the  grounds 
enjoying  the  beautiful  flowers,  the  magnificent 
buildings  and  the  charming  statuary.  When  the 
galleries  were  opened  we  usually  separated  as  we 
were  not  always  interested  in  the  same  exhibits. 
In  the  evening  we  dined  at  the  same  place  and  rested 
an  hour  in  her  room,  then  back  to  the  grounds 
where  we  each  took  rolling-chairs  in  which  we  made 
the  rounds. 

4 'She  was  indeed  wonderful,  her  mentality  simply 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

astonishing.  During  our  stay  in  San  Francisco,  my 
happiest  experiences  consisted  in  lying  curled-up 
on  the  foot  of  her  bed  listening  to  her  talk.  There 
was  no  subject  that  she  could  not  discuss  learnedly 
and  interestingly.  We  often  sat  up  very  late  while 
she  told  me  of  her  life  in  China.  On  the  way  home, 
she  wanted  me  to  stop  off  and  spend  a  few  days  at 
Mt.  Rainier.  I  am  now  glad  we  did  not  do  so,  the 
only  letter  of  hers  now  in  my  possession  tells  me 
that  she  felt  ill  on  reaching  Seattle,  due  to  drinking 
ice- water  while  on  our  way." 


Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty-Six 


CHAPTER  THIRTY-TWO 

Her  Final  Work 

IN  the  final  two  years  of  her  life  on  earth  Miss 
Fielde  devoted  her  efforts  largely  to  child  wel- 
fare projects.     It  was  her  conviction  that  the 
progress  and  improvement  of  the  race  depended 
principally  on  the  intuitive  promptings  of  mothers 
in  the  care  and  cultivation  of  children,  though  not 
exclusively  so.      In  justification    of    her    faith    in 
womenkind  generally,  she  frequently  made  use  of 
a    quotation    from    "The    Woman    With    Empty 
Hands:" 

"Stop  and  think  what  instinct  really  means. 
When  Nature  wants  a  job  done — a  big  job  like 
keeping  alive  a  species  or  populating  the  earth;  a 
job  requiring  sacrifice  and  self-effacement  and  end- 
less work  and  watching — does  she  call  in  reason, 
argument,  philosophy,  art,  science,  religion,  econ- 
omics, or  philanthropy?  Not  a  bit  of  it!  She 
hands  that  job  over  to  a  fundamental  instinct  and 
instinct  gets  that  job  done.  The  hardest  thing  in 
the  world  to  change  is  a  fundamental  instinct;  for 
it  will  live  on  for  generations  through  untold  cen- 
turies after  the  natural  object  of  it  has  disappeared. 
Women  will  stop  at  nothing  once  the  instinct  calls 
her  to  act,  whether  the  call  comes  from  a  beloved 
person,  a  beloved  institution,  a  beloved  cause,  a 

Page   Three   Hundred   Fifty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

beloved  ideal.    That  is  the  psychology  of  the  whole 
woman's  movement." 

But  she  also  was  a  firm  believer  in  the  eugenic 
culture  of  child  life,  accepting  the  comparatively 
modern  idea  that  environment  is  equally  as 
strong  a  factor  in  human  development  as  heredity. 
She  manifested  this  latter  feeling  in  a  variety  of 
practical  ways.  In  1915  while  attending  a  meet- 
ing of  the  Woman's  Century  Club,  of  Seattle,  Miss 
Fielde  was  impressed  with  the  annual  report  made 
of  the  Washington  State  Federation  of  Women's 
Clubs  Educational  Loan  Fund.  She  soon  after 
called  upon  her  friend,  Mrs.  W.  S.  Griswold  (at 
the  time  recording  secretary  of  the  Federation), 
for  detailed  information.  Upon  Mrs.  Griswold 
relating  that  the  Loan  Fund  was  the  result  of  a  plan 
by  which  the  women's  clubs  of  the  State  sought  to 
aid  ambitious  young  women  by  lending  them 
money  to  enable  them  to  complete  courses  in  high- 
er branches  of  study,  or  to  make  it  possible  for  spe- 
cially endowed  young  girls  to  secure  technical 
training  in  the  development  of  artistic  talents,  Miss 
Fielde  commended  the  project  by  a  subscription  of 
two  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  to  this  fund,  the  larg- 
est single  donation  up  to  that  time.  The  donation 
referred  to  was  only  one  of  many  acts  of  like  char- 
acter. There  was  scarcely  a  period  in  the  final 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty-Eight 


Her  Final  Work 

twenty  years  of  her  life  in  which  some  struggling 
student  did  not  depend  on  her  bounty  for  the  means 
of  acquiring  an  education,  and  not  infrequently 
she  contributed  aid  of  this  kind  to  more  than  one 
individual  at  the  same  time. 

The  Children's  Orthopedic  Hospital,  of  Seat- 
tle, was  an  institution  receiving  Miss  Fielde's  high- 
est approbation.  From  Mrs.  John  W.  Roberts, 
secretary  of  the  Board  of  Trustees,  the  following 
facts  were  obtained: 

"Miss  Fielde  joined  the  Orthopedic  Hospital 
Association  as  an  active  member  in  January,  1 908, 
during  the  first  year  of  the  institution. 

"She  gave  valuable  aid  to  the  Trustees  in  re- 
vising the  By-Laws,  and  in  the  formation  of  the 
Guilds  which  have  done  most  effective  work  in 
support  of  the  hospital.  She  always  attended  the 
business  meetings  of  the  active  members  and  the 
open  meetings  held  at  the  hospital. 

"She  was  present  at  the  little  public  party  given 
on  the  first  day  of  June,  1915,  at  the  hospital  on 
Queen  Anne  Hill,  and  went  about  carefully  inspect- 
ing the  wards,  surgery,  kitchen,  etc.,  speaking  lov- 
ingly as  she  passed  to  the  little  ones  in  the  snowy- 
beds,  and  all  the  while  asking  shrewd  and  intelli- 
gent questions  of  the  Trustee  who  accompanied 
her. 

"A  few  days  later,  the  writer  was  pleased  to  re- 
ceive a  checque  for  $250  for  a  Life  Membership 

Page  Three  Hundred  Fifty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

for  Miss  Fielde  and  a  letter  characteristic  of  this 
good  woman,  in  which  she  paid  deserved  praise  to 
the  surgeons  who  give  their  services  free  to  the 
destitute  crippled  child,  and  extending  appreciation 
and  encouragement  to  those  in  charge  of  the  hos- 
pital." 

In  June,  1915,  Miss  Fielde  systematically  took 
up  the  work  of  distributing  circulars  of  instruction 
and  information  to  mothers,  actual,  prospective  and 
potential,  regarding  the  scientific  care  and  upbring- 
ing of  children.  One  of  her  diary  notes  of  about 
that  date  contains  this  significant  entry: 

" Yesterday  I  walked  on  Capitol  Hill.  The  sky 
was  gloriously  broad  and  blue ;  the  mountains  loom- 
ed resplendent  in  the  azure;  there  were  stretches 
of  bloom  in  the  Park  where  I  lingered  long.  Then, 
on  my  way  homeward,  I  passed  a  little  go-cart 
holding  a  baby  girl  who  smiled  enchantingly  at  me, 
a  stranger.  Ever  since  I  have  not  thought  much 
of  the  broad  sky,  the  mountains  or  the  flowers,  but 
of  the  smile  of  that  baby.  When  one  is  about  to 
plunge  into  the  last  quarter  of  a  possible  century  of 
life,  one  thinks  carefully  of  what  one  might  do  to 
make  the  State  a  better  place  for  babies  to  grow  up 
in.  To  me  that  is  politics;  and  I  am  merged  in 
politics.'* 

A  written  account  of  other  incidents  which 
prompted  Miss  Fielde  to  engage  in  the  undertaking 
is  contained  in  one  of  her  scrapbooks  as  well  as  a 

Page  Three  Hundred  Sixty 


Her  Final  Work 

printed  outline  of  her  plan  of  operation.     Of  the 
incidents  she  wrote: 

"A  few  days  ago  I  went  to  see  some  trained  ani- 
mals at  Pantages  Theatre.  A  young  woman  hold- 
ing on  her  lap  a  sleeping  infant  sat  beside  me.  I  in- 
quired the  age  of  the  child  and  received  the  reply: 
'She  is  five  weeks  old  today;  and  this  is  the  first 
matinee  she  has  been  to.'  The  child  slept  constant- 
ly through  the  hours  and  seemed  to  have  been 
doped.  In  a  street  car,  I  saw  a  young  mother  teach- 
ing an  infant  to  suck  its  thumb.  At  political  meet- 
ings I  have  seen  young  children  kept  awake  until 
after  eleven  o'clock.  Such  observations  have  made 
me  feel  that  a  most  useful  undertaking  would  be 
the  dissemination  of  selected  pamphlets  among 
mothers,  who  should  pay  the  cost  of  the  pamphlets, 
as  an  evidence  of  interest  in  them.  To  start  this 
work,  I  have  supplied  the  necessary  money  for  the 
pamphlets  selected  by  me;  and  it  will  be  called  the 
'Fielde  Pamphlet  Fund,'  to  be  permanently  used  by 
the  Seattle  Congress  of  Mothers  for  the  object 
designated." 

Regarding  her  methods  of  doing  this  work,  she 
wrote : 

"I  got  the  assent  of  the  Congress  of  Mothers,  of 
Seattle,  to  co-operate  with  me ;  Mrs.  C.  E.  Bogardus, 
the  chairman,  giving  the  use  of  a  room  in  her  home 
for  office  purposes,  storage  of  supplies,  etc.  The 
literature,  selected  by  me,  consists  of  three  pam- 
phlets, of  the  highest  authorization:  (1  )  The  Care 
of  the  Baby,'  issued  by  the  United  States  Public 

Page   Three  Hundred   Sixty-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

Health  Service,  Washington,  D.  C;  (2)  The  Care 
of  the  Baby/  issued  by  the  Russel  Sage  Founda- 
tion, New  York;  and  (3)  'Save  the  Babies/  issued 
by  the  American  Medical  Association,  Chicago, 
Illinois.  Then  I  wrote  and  had  printed  eight  thou- 
sand copies  of  the  following  circular  letter: 

'To  the  Parents  of  the  Northwest  from  the 
Pamphlet  Committee  of  the  Seattle  Central  Council 
of  the  Congress  of  Mothers  and  Parent-Teacher 
Associations : 

1  'Probably  the  greatest  joys  and  the  deepest 
sorrows  of  life  ordinarily  come  to  men  and  women 
through  their  children. 

'The  family  is  the  source  of  well-being  for  the 
individual  and  for  the  nation.  Instruction  of  the 
mother  in  the  care  of  the  infant,  before  and  after  its 
birth,  will  greatly  help  the  baby  and  the  family  in- 
to which  it  comes. 

1  'Pamphlets  giving  advice  concerning  the  care 
of  infants  are  many  and  excellent,  but  the  best  are 
not  always  on  hand  when  most  needed.  For  the 
convenience  of  mothers  of  the  Northwest,  the 
Pamphlet  Committee  of  the  Seattle  Central  Council 
of  the  Congress  of  Mothers  and  Parent-Teacher  As- 
sociations has  undertaken  to  disseminate  selected 
pamphlets  instructive  to  those  who  have  the  care 
of  infants. 

1  'By  acquiring  many  thousands  of  these  pamph- 
lets in  a  large  order,  doing  the  work  of  distribution 
without  compensation,  and  engaging  the  interest 
and  help  of  many  persons  as  volunteer  workers, 
these  pamphlets  can  be  supplied  at  lowest  cost. 

Pagre  Three  Hundred  Sixty-Two 


Her  Final  Work 

4  'A  fund  sufficient  for  buying  the  pamphlets 
at  cost  of  printing  and  transportation  has  been  pro- 
vided, with  the  expectation  that  all  income  from  the 
sales  will  be  returned  to  the  fund  so  that  it  may  be 
repeatedly  used  and  always  preserved  without  di- 
munition  of  the  original  amount. 

*  'No  pamphlets  will  be  delivered  in  any  way  but 
by  mail,  addressed  to  the  person  who  has  prepaid 
the  required  sum  marked  on  the  wrapper  of  the 
pamphlets.  Only  one  set  will  be  sent  to  one  ad- 
dress. The  name  and  address  should  be  given  with 
care. 

'  'In  addition  the  Pamphlet  Committee  expects 
that  two  valuable  pamphlets,  "Prenatal  Care'*  and 
"Infant  Care"  will  be  mailed  direct  from  the  Chil- 
dren's Bureau  at  Washington,  D.  C..  to  each  address 
recorded,  these  addresses  being  forwarded  by  the 
Pamphlet  Committee  to  said  Bureau  on  forms  ob- 
tained therefrom. 

'With  an  individual  library  consisting  of  these 
authoritative  instructions,  the  careful  mother  will 
equip  herself  with  necessary  knowledge,  and  her 
outlay  need  be  but  one  dime. 

1  'By  a  generous  effort,  any  person  can  bring 
these  helpful  pamphlets  to  the  attention  of  young 
mothers,  so  as  to  benefit  any  who  would  otherwise 
know  nothing  of  these  pamphlets. 

'  'A  strong,  handsomer,  happier  folk  may  live 
in  the  Northwest  fifty  years  hence,  if  we  do  this 
work  now.  Remember  that  it  is  all  unremunerat- 
ed  work  if  we  consider  the  purse  alone;  but  it  is 

Fage   Three   Hundred   Sixty-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

most  remunerative  if  we  consider  human  health 
and  happiness.  Take  hold  of  it  with  us  and  help 
the  parents  of  the  Northwest  rear  perfect  chil- 
dren.' ' 

The  three  pamphlets  and  the  circular  letter  were 
enclosed  in  one  envelope  and  sent  to  the  mothers 
of  young  children  in  all  parts  of  the  State.  In  order 
to  learn  the  names  and  addresses  of  those  most  like- 
ly to  be  interested  in  this  class  of  literature,  Miss 
Fielde  practically  organized  a  State-wide  bureau  of 
vital  statistics,  secured  by  volunteer  helpers.  Her 
contribution  to  the  work  of  race  improvement  from 
her  efforts  in  this  direction  is  a  problem  that  only 
the  coming  ages  can  solve. 


Page  Three  Hundred  Sixty-Four 


CHAPTER  THIRTY-THREE 

Her  Last  Journey 

EARLY  in  the  month  of  February,  1916,  Miss 
Fielde  reached  the  end  of  her  work  on  earth. 
At  that  time  she  experienced  what  really 
amounted  to  a  physical  collapse.  While  she  did  not 
at  once  take  to  her  bed,  she  was  in  such  a  condi- 
tion of  bodily  weakness  that  she  remained  closely 
confined  to  her  home  and  strictly  avoided  every 
effort  that  required  the  expenditure  of  physical 
energy.  In  a  letter  to  an  eastern  friend  she  wrote 
"Please  do  not  send  me  newspaper  clippings, 
pamphlets,  books  or  anything  else  that  must  be  re- 
turned, no  matter  how  good.  These  are  days  when 
the  slightest  duty  is  irksome  to  me.  I  have  reach- 
ed the  time  when  the  'grasshopper  seems  a  bur- 
den/ ' 

The  breakdown  came  very  suddenly  and  was  a 
great  surprise  to  her  friends,  if  not  wholly  unex- 
pected by  herself.  Only  a  few  weeks  previous  she 
had  been  as  active  as  at  any  other  time  of  her  life, 
despite  the  fact  that  she  had  just  passed  the  seventy- 
seventh  anniversary  of  her  birth.  Apparently  she 
had  been  for  the  past  year  in  good  health,  contented 
with  life  and  greatly  enjoying  the  work  that  the 
passing  days  brought  to  her  hands  and  the  recrea- 
tions that  she  so  abundantly  earned.  In  the  latter 
part  of  November  she  had  attended  a  "Parliamen- 

Fage  Three  Hundred  Sixty-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

tary  Breakfast,"  a  social  function  given  to  celebrate 
the  close  of  the  second  class  for  women  in  parlia- 
mentary procedure,  which  she  herself  had  organized 
two  years  before.*  On  the  occasion  of  the  "Break- 
fast** she  took  the  leading  part  in  the  discussions 
and  festivities  as  usual.  Subsequent  events  proved 
this  to  have  been  her  last  public  meeting. 

Also  during  the  fall  of  1915  she  seemed  to  take 
unusual  pleasure  in  the  society  and  companion- 
ship of  her  more  intimate  friends.  While  planning 
and  preparing  for  the  "Breakfast,**  she  was  a  guest 
at  Braeburn,  the  country  home  of  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
A.  B.  Stewart,  of  Seattle;  and  at  Christmas  of  the 
same  year,  contrary  to  a  long  established  custom, 
she  spent  the  day  at  the  home  and  with  the  family 
of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  W.  D.  Perkins. 

The  opinion  obtained  among  a  number  of  Miss 
Fielde*s  more  intimate  friends  that  the  suddenness 
of  her  decline  was  largely  due  to  reaction.  For  two 
years  she  had  worked  very  hard  for  State-wide  pro- 
hibition, devoting  nearly  the  whole  of  her  time, 
energy  and  effort  to  the  success  of  that  movement. 
When  victory  was  finally  won  at  the  polls  in  No- 
vember, 1915,  she  was  very  happy,  feeling  that  she 
had  been  singularly  blessed  in  being  permitted  to 

*The  interest  manifested  in  Parliamentary  Procedure  in  wom- 
en's organizations  in  Seattle  is  largely  due  to  Miss  Fielde.  The 
Rota  Club  of  New  York  City,  taught  by  her  for  years,  is  also 
doing  efficient  work  along  parliamentary  lines. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Sixty-Six 


Her  Last  Journey 

crown  her  long  and  useful  life  by  her  contributions 
to  that  glorious  achievement.  It  is  not  an  improb- 
able theory  that  the  strenuous  work  that  she  per- 
formed in  the  cause  of  prohibition  may  have  ex- 
hausted her  vital  strength  beyond  her  power  to  re- 
cuperate. 

But  it  is  not  to  be  understood  that  her  mentality 
suffered  any  loss  of  strength  because  of  her  physical 
disabilities.  On  the  contrary  her  mind  remained 
as  alert  as  ever  and  her  interest  in  current  events 
undiminished.  She  was  intensely  interested  in  the 
world  war  and  followed  the  daily  movements  of 
the  contending  forces  with  the  most  minute  atten- 
tion to  details;  the  fact  that  she  was  personally 
familiar  with  many  of  the  localities  in  which  this 
great  struggle  was  taking  place  was  a  decided  help 
in  carrying  out  this  program.  In  a  letter  to  an 
intimate  friend,  written  shortly  before  her  death, 
she  wrote  touchingly  of  the  war  and  makes  some 
significant  comments  concerning  herself,  a  part  of 
which  follows: 

"I  am  very,  very  sorrowful  under  the  daily  news 
of  the  fiery  maelstrom  in  Europe;  sick  at  heart  on 
account  of  the  killing  of  men  and  all  the  evils  that 
come  of  war.  It  is  all  so  horrible  that  I  cannot  let 
myself  think  of  it  much  less  write  of  it.  The  situa- 
tion with  us  is  ominous  and  I  can  only  say  'Heaven 
help  and  keep  America.'  In  my  heartsickness  I 
have  turned  again  to  my  beloved  natural  sciences 

Page   Three   Hundred   Sixty-Seven 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

for  consolation  and  distraction,  and  am  reading  J. 
Henri  Fabre,  entomologist,  and  am  fascinated. 

"Years  ago  I  decided  to  repose,  read  and  medi- 
tate ;  but  things  in  the  Northwest  so  appealed  to  me 
that  I  have  not  yet  fully  quitted  work.  I  am  strug- 
gling out  of  it,  however,  and  will  soon  be  soaring 
on  my  two  dependable  wings,  simplicity  and  spon- 
taniety.  More  than  two  years  ago  I  plunged  into 
the  last  quarter  of  my  possible  century  of  life.  I 
am  just  as  happy  as  I  was  in  the  first  quarter.  I  find 
little  cause  for  worry,  or  disquietude.  News  has 
come  recently  of  the  death  of  Mrs.  John  D.  Rocke- 
feller, who  was  a  member  of  my  Tuesday  Round 
Table.  She  was  born  in  the  same  year  as  was  I. 
My  contemporaries  are  falling  like  leaves  in  Au- 
tumn." 

The  writer  hereof  spent  the  evening  of  February 
seventh  with  Miss  Fielde  in  her  apartments  at  the 
San  Marco.  During  the  visit  she  noticed  that  her 
hostess*  appearance  denoted  certain  physical 
changes  that  were  not  at  all  reassuring,  though  her 
mind  seemed  as  clear  as  ever  and  her  conversation 
sparkled  as  usual  with  entertaining  thoughts  and 
humorous  sayings.  Before  leaving  the  writer  told 
Miss  Fielde  of  her  impressions  and  misgivings  and 
begged  her  to  consult  a  physician  regarding  her 
health.  Miss  Fielde  in  reply  said:  I  have  an  ap- 
pointment with  my  physician  for  9  o'clock  tomor- 
row morning,  though  expressing  doubts  as  to  her 

Page  Three  Hundred  Sixty-Eight 


Her  Last  Journey 

need  of  medical  attention.  Before  noon  the  fol- 
lowing day  the  writer  received  a  message,  tele- 
phoned by  Miss  Fielde's  maid,  to  the  effect  that 
Miss  Fielde  wished  to  see  her  at  once.  On  arriving 
at  the  San  Marco  she  was  informed  that  Miss  Fielde 
was  ill  and  was  shown  directly  into  the  bed-room. 
After  the  exchange  of  customary  greetings,  Miss 
Fielde  said:  "My  dear,  Dr.  C.  W.  Sharpies  has 
just  told  me  that  I  am  afflicted  with  a  malady  for 
which,  at  my  age,  there  is  no  remedy  or  cure.  As  I 
wished  to  be  fully  informed  I  asked  him  to  tell  me 
how  long  approximately  I  would  remain  here.  In 
reply  he  said  'it  might  be  several  months,  but  more 
probably  it  would  be  only  for  a  few  weeks  and  per- 
haps but  for  a  few  days/  I  am  perfectly  satisfied 
to  go  into  my  next  life  and  I  hope  the  call  will  soon 
come;  but  we  will  talk  of  my  journey  to  eternity 
later  on.  At  present  I  have  many  things  to  do  be- 
fore I  go.  My  financial  affairs  are  already  off  my 
mind,  as  this  morning  I  gave  them  into  the  hands 
of  Mr.  George  H.  Walker,  my  friend  and  lawyer. 
Now  I  must  go  to  work  to  'set  my  house  in  order' 
while  I  have  possession  of  my  mental  faculties  and 
the  necessary  physical  strength.  I  sent  for  you  and 
Mrs.  W.  D.  Perkins  to  help  me  do  this." 

Miss  Fielde's  idea  of  "setting  her  house  in  or- 
der" consisted  of  an  ante-mortem  distribution  of  her 
personal  effects,  which  was  done  under  her  direc- 
tion, and  which  left  her  rooms  stripped  of  nearly 

Pag1?    Three   Hundred    Sixty-Nine 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

everything  except  the  ordinary  articles  of  house- 
hold furniture.  Her  comparatively  large  collection 
of  valuable  books  she  gave  to  the  University  of 
Washington,  insisting  on  their  being  removed  at 
once;  her  author's  copies  of  the  ten  books  she  her- 
self had  written  were  sent  to  the  Smithsonian  In- 
stitution; her  six  scrap-books,  containing  a  collec- 
tion of  the  many  newspaper  notices,  comments  and 
criticisms  which  were  published  concerning  her  life 
and  public  works  for  nearly  forty  years,  which  she 
called  her  literary  remains,  were  expressed  to  Mrs. 
Samuel  Milbank  Cauldwell,  of  Hartsdale,  New 
York;  also  many  packages  containing  souvenirs 
and  keepsakes,  which  she  herself  had  wrapped  and 
addressed,  were  distributed  among  her  more  intim- 
ate women  friends  and  acquaintances  of  Seattle. 

This  work  was  followed  by  Miss  Fielde' s  dicta- 
tion of  letters  to  friends  in  the  Eastern  states,  an- 
nouncing the  fact  of  her  illness  and  the  probable 
event  in  her  early  death,  of  which  the  writer 
served  in  the  capacity  of  amanuensis.  These  let- 
ters were  written  to  Dr.  Charles  M.  Cauldwell,  of 
New  York,  for  the  Cauldwell  family;  to  Mrs.  Wil- 
liam Pierson  Hamilton,  of  New  York;  and  to  Dr. 
Edward  J.  Nolan,  of  Philadelphia;  and  were  in  real- 
ity gems  of  literary  art,  expressing  as  they  did  the 
most  beautiful  sentiments  of  philosophic  vision  and 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy 


Her  Last  Journey 

religious  conviction.  For  obvious  reasons  the  let- 
ters cannot  be  reproduced  here  in  their  entirety,  but 
permission  has  been  granted  to  publish  an  excerpt 
from  one  of  them,  which  follows: 

"It  is  expedient  for  you  to  know  that  I  am  seri- 
ously ill.  I  may  stay  several  months  longer  where 
I  now  am,  but  yesterday  my  physician  informed  me 
that  he  had  no  cure  for  my  ailment.  I  suffer  much, 
but  my  friends  here  are  very  good  to  me,  and  all 
that  can  be  done  to  alleviate  my  distress  will  receive 
attention.  The  patience  that  I  must  exercise  in  this 
last  span  of  my  long  life  journey  is  probably  a  need- 
ed test  of  the  discipline  that  life  has  given  me.  How 
glad  I  am  that  you  and  I  have  had  so  profound  a 
friendship  and  so  much  of  true  happiness  in  our 
converse. 

** Any  world  is  good  enough  for  me  to  live  in. 
Through  all  the  centuries  great  throngs  have  been 
passing  over  into  the  *Great  Silence/  The  universe 
could  not  stand  the  strain  were  there  not  something 
desirable  and  joyous  in  the  progress  of  mankind 
from  this  life  to  the  next." 

The  day  following  Miss  Fielde's  confinement  to 
her  bed,  Dr.  Sharpies  installed  Miss  Leila  R.  Ben- 
nett as  the  nurse  of  his  distinguished  patient.  It 
proved  a  fortunate  selection.  Miss  Bennett  had 
known  Miss  Fielde  in  New  York  City,  where  she 
attended  a  class  in  parliamentary  procedure,  of 
which  Miss  Fielde  was  then  the  teacher.  She  was  a 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy-One 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

great  admirer  of  Miss  Fielde  and  was  happy  that 
the  privilege  of  serving  her  had  fallen  to  her  lot. 
Dr.  Sharpies  instructed  Miss  Bennett  not  to  attempt 
any  control  over  Miss  Fielde,  but  to  let  her  have 
her  own  way  in  all  things. 

The  patient  herself  decreed  that  the  normal  life  of 
the  household  should  be  maintained.  There  were 
to  be  no  tears  or  other  exhibitions  of  grief,  but  each 
day  was  to  be  happy  and  joyful.  She  instructed 
Miss  Bennett  not  to  administer  opiates  in  any  form 
to  relieve  her  sufferings  and  to  give  her  no  food  that 
would  prolong  her  life.  In  commenting  on  the  in- 
junction regarding  the  use  of  opiates  Miss  Fielde 
Said:  "I  want  to  die  intelligently.  I  have  many 
friends  who  have  gone  over  and  I  wish  to  be  in  a 
condition  to  speak  to  them  at  once  if  I  should  chance 
to  meet  them.  As  long  as  my  brain  is  alive  I  will 
endure  the  pain  that  will  come  with  my  passing.*' 

One  day  in  discussing  self-destruction  and  the 
use  of  opiates  in  that  connection  with  the  nurse  she 
said: 

4<I  believe  that  in  the  world  to  which  I  am  to  go 
preparations  are  being  made  for  me  just  as  my 
mother  awaited  my  infant  advent.  If  everything 
was  ready  I  would  automatically  go  hence.  I  was 
born  into  this  life  at  full  time  and  I  want  to  go  into 
my  next  life  at  full  time  in  order  that  my  develop- 
ment may  be  complete.  I  do  not  want  to  enter  a 
weakling  as  one  does  who  goes  prematurely." 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy-Two 


Her  Last  Journey 

She  justified  her  refusal  to  partake  of  nourishing 
food  by  declaring  that  there  was  no  wrong  in  ab- 
staining from  an  attempt  to  perpetuate  life  in  a 
worn-out  and  useless  body. 

Miss  Fielde's  illness  lasted  just  two  weeks.  Dur- 
ing that  time  she  persistently  declined  to  receive 
visitors  except  Dr.  Sharpies,  her  physician,  and  Mr. 
Walker,  her  lawyer,  both  of  whom  made  daily  calls. 
Those  who  were  privileged  to  come  to  her  bed- 
side at  her  request  were  Mrs.  W.  D.  Perkins  and 
the  writer  aside  from  Miss  Bennett,  the  nurse,  and 
Nora  Murnan,  the  maid.  Miss  Fielde  had  a  large 
number  of  cherished  friends  among  the  women  of 
Seattle,  many  of  them  anxious  regarding  her  wel- 
fare and  all  of  them  eager  to  see  her.  But  she  stead- 
fastly refused  to  have  any  of  them  admitted  to  her 
sick-room.  She  explained  her  attitude  in  this  re- 
spect by  saying  that  she  could  easily  anticipate 
pleasure  in  the  visits  of  her  friends  but  the  stress 
of  parting  from  them  would  be  too  great  for  her  to 
bear  in  her  weakened  condition.  Notes  of  inquiry, 
messages  of  love  and  flowers  in  abundance  were 
being  constantly  sent  her,  which  pleased  her  very 
much.  It  was  one  of  the  duties  of  the  writer  to 
receive  these  tokens  and  take  them  to  Miss  Fielde's 
room,  where  notes  would  be  read  and  reread  be- 
fore being  destroyed  and  the  flowers  displayed  and 
admired. 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy-Three 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

One  afternoon  two  messages  were  received  by 
the  writer  for  Miss  Fielde  which  were  nearly  iden- 
tical. They  were  from  Mrs.  John  M.  Winslow  and 
Mrs.  John  Trumbull  requesting  Miss  Fielde  to  con- 
sider a  suggestion  to  the  effect  that  possibly  she  was 
making  a  mistake  in  accepting  the  pathological  ver- 
dict that  her  death  was  imminent ;  and  both  begged 
her  to  make  an  effort  to  get  well.  The  argument 
was  used  by  both  that  the  patient  had  been  a  strong 
factor  in  the  development  of  Seattle  women,  who 
still  needed  her;  that  if  her  life  could  be  prolonged 
for  a  few  years  only,  even  greater  good  would  re- 
sult. 

Miss  Fielde  was  strongly  touched  by  the  senti- 
ments thus  expressed,  and  a  look  of  happiness  over- 
spread her  face  when  she  said:  "Tell  them  that  I 
am  truly  glad  that  they  wish  me  to  stay  longer ;  but 
my  going  is  irrevocable ;  nothing  can  delay  it ;  and, 
this  is  for  you  and  for  them  alone,  my  knowledge 
of  that  fact  is  not  so  recent  as  may  be  supposed." 

It  was  another  of  the  duties  of  the  writer  to  re- 
cite the  gist  of  the  daily  news  as  gleaned  from  the 
newspapers  to  Miss  Fielde  each  morning.  For  the 
first  ten  or  twelve  days  of  her  illness  she  was  inter- 
ested in  all  of  the  daily  happenings  in  all  parts  of 
the  world,  especially  so  in  the  progress  of  the  world 
war.  But  as  time  passed  her  interest  became  grad- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy-Four 


Her  Last  Journey 

ually  less  diversified  until  only  accounts  of  the  war 
seemed  to  appeal  to  her.  These  in  time  lost  their 
savor  and  were  finally  discontinued  at  her  request. 

She  took  a  scientific  interest  in  death  which  re- 
mained undiminished  to  the  end.  Her  own  ap- 
proaching demise  she  seemed  inclined  to  regard  as 
an  experiment,  something  impersonal,  for  which 
she  had  no  regret  and  of  which  she  felt  no  fear.  In 
this  light  she  often  discussed  it  during  her  illness 
and  apparently  enjoyed  exchanging  views  concern- 
ing its  mysteries  with  those  around  her.  A  few 
hours  before  death  came  to  her  she  aroused  from  a 
state  of  coma  and  said  to  Miss  Bennett:  "I  am 
passing  through  a  very  peculiar  phase  of  existence ; 
I  am  not  here,  nor  am  I  there.  I  am  now  on  the 
brink."  Few  words  were  spoken  by  her  after. 

Just  before  daybreak  on  February  twenty-third 
the  vigil  of  Miss  Bennett,  Nora  Murnan  and  the 
writer  ended ;  the  great  soul  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 
had  passed  the  portals  of  eternity. 

The  funeral  of  Miss  Fielde,  held  three  days  after 
her  death,  was  a  very  simple  affair.  She  herself  had 
arranged  the  program  of  observances.  It  was  her 
expressed  wish  that  no  clergyman  or  minister  of 
the  gospel  be  appointed  to  officiate  and  that  no  eu- 
logy of  her  should  be  delivered  or  tribute  of  any 
kind  offered.  She  asked  only  that  her  three  favor- 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy-Five 


Life  of  Adele  Marion  Fielde 

ite  hymns  be  sung,  "Lead  Kindly  Light,"  "Abide 
With  Me,"  and  "Jerusalem  the  Golden."  How- 
ever, the  services  were  lengthened  so  as  to  include 
the  reading  of  two  poems,  one,  written  by  Richard 
Watson  Gilder,  called  "Lines  on  the  Death  of  Alice 
Freeman  Palmer;"  the  other  "Crossing  the  Bar." 
The  first  had  been  suggested  by  Miss  Dorothy 
Winslow,  who  was  a  personal  friend  of  Miss  Fielde 
and  an  admirer  of  Mrs.  Palmer.  It  was  her  impres- 
sion that  the  poem  was  equally  applicable  as  a  tri- 
bute to  Miss  Fielde  as  to  Mrs.  Palmer.  It  was  read 
by  Mrs.  John  H.  Powell.  "Crossing  the  Bar"  was 
read  by  Mr.  O.  H.  P.  LaFarge  at  the  close. 

The  last  direction  Miss  Fielde  gave  is  significant : 
"My  ashes  are  to  be  cast  on  the  waters  of  Puget 
Sound.  I  have  loved  this  old  earth  and  I  belong  to 
it,  the  air,  the  sea  and  the  sky,  so  I  want  my  ashes 
to  be  washed  and  purified  before  returning  to  their 
natural  elements." 

A  public  memorial  service  was  held  at  the  Moore 
Theater,  Seattle,  the  Sunday  following  the  funeral, 
at  which  time  tributes  to  the  exalted  character  of 
Miss  Fielde  were  given  by  her  intimate  friends. 

In  closing  this  volume  the  thoughts  and  senti- 
ments expressed  in  a  paragraph  of  a  letter  written 
by  a  friend  in  the  Eastern  states  to  Miss  Fielde  dur- 
ing her  last  illness,  seem  especially  appropriate: 

Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy -Six 


Her  Last  Journey 

"You  have  no  reason  in  any  case  to  dread  the 
'Great  Silence'  for  you  have  been  an  inspiration 
and  a  help  to  all  who  have  had  the  blessing  of  your 
friendship.  I  am  indebted  to  you  personally  for  an 
enlarged  appreciation  of  life;  and  if  this  has  to  be 
good-bye  it  is  in  the  loving  hope  of  a  joyful  reunion 
in  the  gladness  of  our  dear  Lord." 


Page  Three  Hundred  Seventy-Seven 


14  DAY  USE 

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